A U.K. tribunal has recommended erasing the name of a hospital doctor from the medical register for acting dishonestly by performing locum agency work at two National Health Service (NHS) hospital groups while he was employed by another NHS group.
The three-day tribunal run by the Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service (MPTS) concluded on 26 June. It heard that Dr. Jacek Lewit qualified in 1994 at the Military Medical Academy in Lodz, Poland, and he joined the U.K. specialist register for general (internal) medicine in January 2007.
While Lewit was employed under contract by the County Durham and Darlington NHS Foundation Trust (CDDFT), he took paid shifts at other hospitals in North-East England, working on numerous occasions for the South Tyneside and Sunderland NHS Foundation Trust and the North Tees and Hartlepool NHS Foundation Trust.
The MPTS found that Lewit acted dishonestly by performing locum agency work at two hospitals between August 2019 and January 2022. He knew that he was not allowed to undertake locum shift work at another NHS trust on the days and times that he was contracted to work and was being paid by his employing trust. Lewit failed to cease doing the locum work after 26 January 2021, despite giving assurances to his employing trust that he would do so.
The tribunal stated that “his actions were clearly dishonest and had breached fundamental tenets of the profession, namely the requirement to act with honesty and integrity … a finding of dishonesty lies at the top end in the spectrum of gravity of misconduct.”
Furthermore, Lewit did not volunteer that he had been working at more than one trust, and he only admitted to shifts directly put to him in questions. There was a lack of “full and frank admissions about the scale of the locum work he had been doing,” the MPTS pointed out.
Lewit’s employer, CDDFT, sought to recover £17,390 (€20,270), reflecting the 36 extra shifts that had been worked illicitly. This money was repaid by Lewit working 12 additional 12-hour bank shifts without payment. The tribunal stated that whilst this may have been acceptable to CDDFT based on the limited investigation, “it would be inaccurate to say that Lewit has made complete financial recompense because he appears not to have repaid the money received for shifts worked between August 2019 and November 2020.”
Statement from Dr. Jacek Lewit
In a statement to the tribunal dated 13 May 2025, Lewit reflected on his conduct and expressed remorse and apology.
He identified triggers for his behavior, which included his poor financial situation and some other stresses, but the MPTS said “there was a glaring omission in his statement as Dr. Lewit has not reflected on how his conduct fell short of the standard expected of medical practitioners, how it impacted the profession, how it may have breached Good Medical Practice (2024), how he may have brought the profession into disrepute, and how he would ensure he behaves differently next time he is faced with the same difficulties.”
According to the U.K. Government Companies House website, Lewit is the sole director J L MED LTD. He was appointed on 3 February 2014, when the company was based in Darlington. This firm was dissolved in June 2018, but it was then reactivated from a London address on 2 February 2023, with Lewit again being the sole director.
Lewit now has 28 days to lodge an appeal. For more details on the case, go to the MPTS website.
