A specialty certificate carrying another trainee's data and the wrong rector's name: Sofia nose surgeon charged in January 2026 after three years of complaints

In Bulgaria a doctor's right to call himself a specialist rests on a certificate issued by a medical university after years of residency, and clinics are expected to check it before letting anyone operate. The Executive Agency Medical Supervision (IAMN) and the regional health inspectorates (RZI) inspect the clinics; the Bulgarian Medical Association (BLS) keeps the register. The case of a Sofia ear, nose and throat surgeon showed how long every one of those checks can fail at once.

According to Zdrave.net and Boulevard Bulgaria, both reporting on 19 December 2025 on an investigation by NOVA television, Dr Zekeria Batmaz operated in Sofia on the strength of a certificate of completed ENT specialisation that Medical University Sofia says it did not issue. Zdrave.net reported that the document used another trainee's data and carried the name of a rector who was not in office in the period stated. Gospodari.com reported that between 2019 and 2022 he worked at a Sofia medical centre performing rhinoplasties and septoplasties, and that he had since enrolled in a specialisation, which does not give the right to operate alone. On hidden camera he told NOVA he had performed more than 2,000 operations. A complaint went to prosecutors in 2022; prosecutors told NOVA that pre-trial proceedings for a document offence were open and that they were still waiting for an additional medical expert report three years later. The BLS ethics committee said it could not strip a licence and could only assist the competent authorities.

Patients described the results. One woman said two failed operations left her with no cartilage and unable to breathe through her nose; she had it rebuilt from a rib in Turkey and won a civil case against the clinic. A young man described a perforated septum and filler injections every three months, possibly for life. On 23 January 2026, Gospodari.com reported, with Offnews and Vesti.bg carrying the same news, that after dozens of further complaints following the broadcast the Sofia District Prosecutor's Office had charged Dr Batmaz with presenting forged documents and with causing harm to patients' health; Offnews described it as two charges. IAMN and the RZI were continuing checks at several medical establishments linked to the case. He and his lawyer declined interviews.

The mechanism was a forged specialty certificate accepted at face value by employers, and a complaint that sat in the system for three years while he kept operating. Zdrave.net and Gospodari.com noted that in that time he was even granted permission to open his own clinic. Nobody rang the university.

For a patient, or a student weighing a Bulgarian clinic, the check is free: a specialty is a public fact. Ask the university's registrar, not the clinic, whether the certificate number exists, and treat a surgeon who cannot show a verifiable specialisation as a trainee, whatever the sign on the door says.