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Dentist gets more than 3 years' jail after cheating CPF Board, MOH of S$11,750 in MediSave claims

SINGAPORE — A dentist, who had been suspended by the Singapore Dental Council before, was sentenced after cheating the Central Provident Fund (CPF) Board and Ministry of Health (MOH) by submitting false claims for dental procedures.

A stock photo of a dental X-ray.

A stock photo of a dental X-ray.

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  • Dentist John Sun, formerly known as Sng Wee Hock, 50, submitted false claims for his patients who were doing dental implants
  • In doing so, he received disbursements of S$11,750 from the Central Provident Fund Board and Ministry of Health for seven false claims
  • He deceived them by writing that he performed dental procedures on the patients that did not happen
  • His trial went on over three years and the judge noted that he lacked remorse and abused court processes
  • Sentenced to 37 months' jail, he is set to return to court to appeal against his conviction and sentence

SINGAPORE — A dentist, who had been suspended by the Singapore Dental Council before, was sentenced after cheating the Central Provident Fund (CPF) Board and Ministry of Health (MOH) by submitting false claims for dental procedures.

John Sun, who was formerly known as Sng Wee Hock, 50, was sentenced to 37 months' jail on Monday (Aug 28) on seven cheating charges and seven forgery charges.

The total disbursement made to him for seven false claims amounted to S$11,750.

He was convicted earlier this year of forging X-ray imageries of his patients so that he could receive disbursements from MediSave, a national medical savings scheme under the CPF Board that allows account holders to pay for certain healthcare needs.

The trial for Sun's case took place over three years.

Deputy Presiding Judge Christopher Tan told the court that Sun showed a lack of remorse throughout the trial and also conducted his defence in an extravagant manner where his defence counsels cross-examined witnesses at length such that witnesses had to keep repeating themselves.

The judge added that Sun also made court proceedings difficult and abused the process: "The accused brought the court on a long and expensive cruise to nowhere."

Shortly after the sentence was delivered, Sun's defence counsels told the court that they would be filing an appeal on behalf of their client against the conviction and sentence.

He is expected to return to court on Sept 8 for a post-sentence hearing.

In 2017, Sun was suspended by the Singapore Dental Council for allowing two foreign-trained dentists under him to provide dental treatment without supervision.

WHAT HAPPENED

Between 2013 and 2014, Sun made MediSave claims for his patients that were fraudulently filed for surgical procedures listed as foreign body removal and autogenous bone graft. He did not perform any of these. 

At the time of his offences, he was running his own practice, WH Dental Surgeons, which had branches in Hougang, Punggol and Seletar.

Sun would submit false claims for his patients in order to bypass the MediSave withdrawal limit for dental implants. 

MediSave can be used to pay for dental implant insertion or removal as long as it is a surgical procedure. However, the cap is up to S$1,900 for dental implants.

He would quote his patients a price of around S$4,000 for each implant and told them that it would be fully or largely paid for through MediSave.

Deputy Public Prosecutors Suhas Malhotra and Gerald Tan said that this was not true because the claims for each dental implant were capped at a range of S$950 and S$1,250.

After a patient agreed to the MediSave claim, Sun would file it to say that the patient had either undergone a foreign body removal or autogenous bone graft procedure, even though they did not.

When MOH conducted an audit and requested documents to show that the procedures claimed had been performed, Sun submitted fake ones using forged photos of X-rays that have either been doctored — with dental elements superimposed — or are photocopies of the X-rays and not the original copies.

Sun's ability to conduct eight foreign body removal procedures in a year, based on the MediSave claims he filed, was also disputed because this procedure is extremely rare and the National Dental Centre is reported to conduct such a procedure just once every few years. 

The term "foreign body" refers to an object in a patient's mouth that should not be there. Foreign body removal is more commonly done on victims of vehicle trauma accidents where glass becomes lodged in their mouth, for instance.

Court documents also stated that Sun did not use any imaging devices to help find the location of the alleged foreign bodies, thus making it impossible for him to execute the procedure.

The changes that Sun made were meant to deceive MOH into believing that the procedures had been performed so as to ensure that the ministry does not take back the wrongful disbursements after the audit.

In delivering his sentence, Deputy Presiding Judge Tan said that general deterrence is important because Sun had defrauded public institutions and manipulated CPF to siphon money, abusing the trust of his patients.

He added that such offences are inherently difficult to detect and it was important to ensure that other members of the same profession would be dissuaded to engage in similar conduct.

For committing forgery, Sun could have been jailed for up to 10 years and fined.

For cheating, he could have been jailed for up to 10 years and fined.

Related topics

court crime MediSave dentist forgery

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