Three and a half years treating psychiatric patients on a Russian diploma the federal commission had accepted as genuine: the Aargau case, and the Bulgarian "doctorate" that was also not real

Switzerland recognises foreign medical diplomas through a federal commission, MEBEKO, and lists recognised doctors in a public register. In 2025 a case in Aargau showed what happens when the commission recognises a diploma that was not what it appeared to be.

According to Bluewin, a woman worked at the Aargau psychiatric services, PDAG, from January 2022 until the summer of 2025, treating patients, making diagnoses and prescribing medication, without a valid medical degree. She was in the register on the basis of a Russian medical diploma that MEBEKO had at the time recognised as genuine. The matter is now a criminal investigation. In a separate case reported by Blick, a Bulgarian doctor was convicted in the canton of Zurich over a false doctoral title, which the court noted was not his only offence. NZZ and Watson have reported other convictions of false doctors in Ticino and at the district court in Uster, the latter involving a man with a Venezuelan background.

The Aargau case is the uncomfortable one, because the system did its check. The diploma was examined, accepted and registered; the hospital hired a registered doctor; and the register was wrong for three and a half years. Document examination is not source verification, and a well-made foreign diploma from a country where verification is slow or unreliable can pass the first and fail the second years later, when someone finally asks the university.

For students, two consequences. If you study in a country whose universities are hard for foreign regulators to verify, your genuine degree will be treated with the suspicion earned by the forged ones, and recognition may take years or be withdrawn. And "recognised by the Swiss commission", "accepted by the GMC", "approved by the NMC" describe a decision that can be reversed when the underlying document turns out to be false. Recognition follows the document; it does not launder it.