Original article (in Slovenian) was published on 03/05/2022
According to the University Medical Centre Ljubljana, a non-existent doctor with the name ‘Pavla Rajher’ does not work at the Dermatology Clinic, she is not a dermatologist, and, based on data from the Slovenian Statistical Office, she is also not a resident of Slovenia.
“On average, people live for another 15 years after contracting a fungal infection. 61% of those infected dies within 10 years,” claimed an advertisement for the supposed antifungal medicine clavosan, which was brought to our attention by a reader.
In the advertisement, Pavla Rajher, a “specialist dermatologist at the Regional Dermatology Clinic in Ljubljana”, answered questions about potentially fatal nail fungus and the antifungal remedy that is supposedly more effective than others in the market.
There are no regional dermatology clinics in Slovenia. There is, however, a Dermatovenerology Clinic in Ljubljana, which is part of the University Medical Centre. There, they confirmed to Razkrinkavanje.si that a person with the name Pavla Rajher is not employed by the University Medical Centre nor is there a dermatologist in Slovenia with this name.
According to the Statistical Office database of Slovenian names and surnames, there are also no persons named Pavla Rajher in Slovenia.
The photo purporting to be that of Pavla Rajher is a photo of a doctor available at one of the stock photography websites, as revealed by TinEye, an online search engine for image identification.
In the advert, the fictitious doctor claims, among other things, that more than half of the staff at “her hospital” do not have the necessary qualifications, which is why she doubts their ability to diagnose and treat fungal infections. “More often than not people would be better off staying at home than be treated by a doctor working in a public healthcare institution,” she says.
Responding to these claims for Razkrinkavanje.si, Bogomir Marko Pij, Head of the Department of Dermatology and Venereal Diseases at the University Medical Centre Maribor and member of the Expanded Professional Board of Dermatovenerology at the Slovenian Ministry of Health, stressed that all dermatovenerologists in Slovenia have the necessary professional qualifications and have passed the specialist exam.
The claim that answers to the questions in the advertisement were given by a specialist at the Regional Dermatology Clinic in Ljubljana Pavla Rajher is false.