Veteran's Administration Psychiatrist Domingo Cerra-Fernandez Suspended for Sexual Misconduct

October 11, 2018

On October 3, 2018, the New York State Department of Health's Board for Professional Medical Conduct ("NY Board") issued a Consent Order suspending the license of psychiatirst Domingo Cerra-Fernandez for two years and stayed the entire suspension. The NY Board also fined him $2,500. 

The Board's document states that this action was taken in response to a disciplinary action that The Florida Medical Board ("FL Board") took against Cerra-Fernandez. On September 27, 2017, the FL Board suspended Cerra-Fernandez for six months for having engaged in sexual misconduct with a patient. The FL Board also imposed upon him an administrative fine of $20,000 and ordered him to reimburse its investigative costs of $9,959.89. 

According to the FL Board's documents, Cerra-Fernandez, who works at the Veteran's Administration's Ocallaghan VA Outpatient Clinic in Ocala, treated patient "M.W." from 2002 to April 2012 for depression, anxiety, anorexia, bulimia, and other issues. In or around October 2011, he requested that he and M.W. start a romantic relationship, and she agreed. Between October 2011 and April 2012, Cerra-Fernandez and M.W. dated and had inappropriate contact by email, text, and telephone. 

In October 2011, Cerra-Fernandez requested that M.W. inform his office that she did not want to be treated by him anymore. His patient records indicate on October 20, 2011, that M.W. was going to find another physician in her healthcare network, and she was requesting that Cerra-Fernandez write her prescriptions for thirty days.

However, they did not follow Cerra-Fernandez's plan. Rather, he continued to treat M.W. from October 2011 through April 2012, while also maintaining a romantic relationship with her.

The FL Board determined that Cerra-Fernandez "used his professional physician-patient relationship as treating psychiatrist to engage or attempt to engage in, or to induce or attempted to induce the patient to engage in, verbal or physical sexual activity outside the scope of the professional practice of medicine." 

Source: Consent Order in the Matter of Domingo Cerra-Fernandez, M.D., BPMC NO. 18-217, New York State Dept. of Health, October 3, 2018 and Final Order, Dept. of Health vs. Domingo Cerra-Fernandez, M.D., DOH Case No. 2015-27897, License No. ME0040308, State of Florida Board of Medicine, February 28, 2018.