Hawaii Acupuncture Board Revokes License Of Former Member

Mike Hashimoto had continued practicing despite a 2019 order not to.

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Mike Hashimoto had continued practicing despite a 2019 order not to.

The Hawaii Board of Acupuncture on Thursday revoked the license of Mike Hashimoto, who was instrumental in shaping state regulations for the profession and served on the board himself for more than two decades.

In 2019, Hashimoto signed a settlement agreement, approved by the board, allowing him to retain his license only for the purposes of providing clinical instruction to acupuncture students. The agreement was the result of an investigation by the state Regulated Industries Complaints Office into a report by one of Hashimoto’s patients that he had engaged in sexually inappropriate contact.

Acupuncturist Mike Hashimoto, who helped set up the board that regulates his profession, was himself been accused of misconduct by a patient. (John Hill/Civil Beat/2019)

Despite that agreement, Hashimoto afterwards made a complaint to the state about insurance company Geico, which he claimed had underpaid him for treatments done well after he was supposed to stop seeing patients.

Civil Beat asked RICO about the apparent violation of the agreement in January. On Thursday, after meeting in closed session with an attorney for the Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs, board members voted to revoke Hashimoto’s license.

Civil Beat’s community health coverage is supported by the Atherton Family Foundation, Swayne Family Fund of Hawaii Community Foundation, the Cooke Foundation and Papa Ola Lokahi.

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