Curtsinger v. HCA, Inc.
Dr. Curtsinger’s case illustrates one of the traps for the unwary in medical staff privileging cases. Dr. Curtsinger was summarily suspended, but was reinstated upon agreeing to a leave of absence to fulfill certain conditions for reinstatement. Upon completion of those conditions, Dr. Curtsinger requested return from his leave of absence; the hospital…
My last MedLaw Blog post described four rules for making the peer review process fair. Here are four rules physicians should follow to protect themselves regardless of the peer review process.
1. Recognize peer review when it is happening to you. There is no doubt that peer review is occurring when you get a letter proposing…
Sham peer review is created and perpetuated by secrecy. Charles Mackay wrote in “Eternal Justice”:
“But the sunshine aye shall light the sky,
As round and round we run;
And the truth shall ever come uppermost,
And justice shall be done.”
Physicians do not need voluminous due process protections in medical staff bylaws in order to…
The United States District Court for the District of Iowa held that Mercy Medical Center-Sioux City was not immune from liability under the Federal Health Care Quality Improvement Act. The Court entered summary judgment to the estate of Dr. Horst G. Blume on the basis of Mercy’s breach of contract and awarded damages to Dr. Blume…
RESTRICTIVE COVENANT UNENFORCEABLE
BY SURVIVING SPOUSE
The Virginia Supreme Court ruled that a medical practice corporation, ownership of which had transferred from the deceased sole physician shareholder to his spouse and which was converted to a business corporation by state law, could not enforce a restrictive covenant because it could not practice medicine and had…
A California court recently concluded that exhaustion of administrative remedies was not required as a condition precedent to reinstatement of a physician. The summary description of this holding is somewhat misleading, because it is commonly accepted that physicians must exhaust their administrative remedies, i.e., the medical staff peer review hearing process, before pursuing either civil or…
A comment by Al Tobias www.medicalaw.net indicates the problem with the new proposed standars for disruptive physicians. There are no standards. This is an open invitation for hospitals to impose new peer review issues on physicians with the support of the Joint Commission.
JOINT COMMISSION PROPOSES STANDARDS FOR DISRUPTIVE PHYSICIANS
The Joint Commission (which has always been the informal name for the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO) and which will now be its formal name) has proposed disruptive behavior standards for Joint Commission accreditation, which it intends to apply in early 2007.
The new standard…
“The U. S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania ruled that Lewistown Hospital was not entitled to recover the legal costs incurred fighting the allegations of Dr. Alan D. Gordon under the Sherman Act because the hospital could not show the claims brought by the ophthalmologist were frivolous or unreasonable, or brought in…
Cowett v. TCH Pediatrics Inc. seems to endorse bad faith peer review, but a closer examination of the opinion should reveal a significant distinction between bad faith peer review and peer review involving legitimate peer review concerns in situations which also include bad faith motivations among the peer review entities.
After following the fair hearing…
