INDEX
October 30, 2013 - Kaiser Nurse Diagnosed with Breast Cancer Was Harassed, Refused Treatment and Finally Fired -- by her Hospital
Aug
9, 2013 - Patients rated seven HMOs including Kaiser's Southern
California system as poor, or just one star, on whether they were able
to get care easily.
Whistleblowers
Chris Rauber Coverage with the SF Business
Times
06/26/2012
Feb 28 2011
- California orders Kaiser to stop denying
physical, occupational and speech therapy to certain patients
mirrored for historical purposes here
Orange
County Stories
Kaiser
Fresno Stories
Kaiser
Layoffs
Kaiser
Autism Stories
Kaiser
canceled patient after payment - 02/12/2009
Kaiser
Call Center Stories
Patient
Dumping Stories (20)
Kaiser
Transplant
Issues (27)
Kaiser
Children Stories (20)
Medical
Board and DMHC and other State Regulatory Agency Stories
Hospital/Medication
Excuse of Error
Corporate
Cost Saving which resulted
in patient death or injury stories
Hospitalization
Cutting Stories
Medical
Record Stories
Patient
Disease related to unclean practices at hospitals or unsterilized
equipment
Sarah
Nome Stories -
Elderly patient evicted
from hospital stories
Kaiser
employee molester
stories
Arbitration
Stories (6)
Kaiser
Lost Bodies Stories
Kaiser
and DHS/HHS/CMS Stories (10)
Kaiser
Profits and Price Gouging Stories
Kaiser
employee
perjury
stories
Patients
and employees that got
a tad bit upset with
Kaiser Stories (4)
Kaiser
Income Tax Stories
Tales
of
Corruption
KaiserPharmacist/Pharmaceutical
Stories
Physician
Financial Incentive Stories
Patient
Opinion Polls
Stories
Sham
Peer
Review Stories
Kaiser
Ad Campaign
Stories
Kaiser
trying to convince
the country that they
must provide national health care stories
Kaiser
Casualty
of The Day from CNA
Patient
Confidentiality and IT stories at the National Page
Kaiser
Computers
Striking
Employees
Equipment
malfunctions that harmed patients
All
Others
|
Please
notice the years of repeat patterns of inappropriate behavior.
October 29, 2013 - LOS ANGELES (CN) - When a nurse needed time off and other
accommodations for breast cancer treatments to save her life, Kaiser
demoted and transferred her, assigned her to work in the flu department
although her doctors warned that an infection could kill her, forced her
to work through her lunch hour to "make up" time she spent at
chemotherapy appointments, and ultimately fired her, she claims in a
lawsuit filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court. See: http://www.courthousenews.com/2013/10/29/62427.htmOctober 5, 2012
Kaiser's Colleen McKeown:
Correcting the record about Kaiser's new hospitals
Mercury News
Kaiser
Papers Opinion of above article - McKeown explains that Kaiser Oakland
will have yet another Oakland hospital that will be used for
the
children in Hayward and other areas in Northern California. That is
quite a distance for children to be from home needlessly.
There
is no mention of accomodations being made for parents to stay with the
children nor anything else that would make them more comfortable.
Centralizing inpatient children is not necessarily a good
thing
to do as a matter of routine. It is one thing for those with
specialized needs but quite another for more routine hospitalizations.
It is simply too far from home, especially with heavy traffic
in
the areas, and the idea of centralization of pediatric patients sounds
too institutional for American tastes when done without true need.
According to this article it really appears to be nothing more than
another way for Kaiser to save money by having the medical staff and
equipment located in one place. More revenue for Kaiser, more
expenses for the parents and certainly more traumatic for the children.
But then, doesn't Kaiser count people only as numbers and not
as
humans? The down side to it probably doesn't matter at all to
Kaiser.
February 28, 2012
From
the Mercury News
California orders Kaiser to stop denying
physical, occupational and speech therapy to certain patients
State
regulators on Monday ordered Kaiser Foundation Health Plan to stop
denying physical, occupational and speech therapy to certain patients.
Mirrored here for historical purposes: https://kaiserpapers.com/fines/kaiser-deny-speech-therapy.html
Kaiser
has declined such therapy to members who lack a "physical condition,"
according to documents filed by the state Department of Managed Health
Care.
September 18, 2011
From The Los Angeles Times
State Senate Health
Chairman Doing Business With Kaiser
Mirrored here for historical purposes: https://kaiserpapers.com/californianews/senator-ed-hernandez.html
A Southern
California lawmaker who helped defeat legislation opposed by Kaiser is
benefiting from a business relationship with the nonprofit health group.
October
19, 2010
Kaiser Permanente in Fresno has terminated the hospital privileges and
credentials of Dr. Hamid Safari after a nearly three-year fight by the
beleaguered perinatologist to keep his job following allegations of
negligence.
Read more: http://www.fresnobee.com/2010/10/18/2123224/fresno-kaiser-hospital-parts-ways.html#ixzz12pZJT0vH
California
looks into HMO medical claim denials
Victoria Colliver,
Chronicle Staff Writer
Friday, September 4, 2009
The state attorney general has launched an
investigation into how health maintenance organizations review and pay
medical claims, the office announced Thursday.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/09/03/BUFB19ICL2.D
Probe
faults Kaiser for leaving brain-injured man on
Sacramento streets
cpeytondahlberg@sacbee.com
Published
Saturday, Aug. 29, 2009
The Kaiser
hospital in south Sacramento
failed to follow state law when it discharged a brain-injured young man
to the streets outside a closed homeless services program, a state
investigation has concluded.
Kaiser's vital
signs defy ailing economy
April 1, 2009 - Kaiser overtook Boeing as the county's top private
employer at least
seven years ago. As if to underscore the shift, Kaiser plans to open a
medical center this year on a Downey plot once used to assemble space
shuttles and Apollo rockets.
Comment - April
5, 2009 - This article
about Kaiser is a slap in the face for its patients who
have died or are suffering from chronic conditions such as cancer and
kidney problems. Kaiser's financial success is largely due to finding
loopholes to prevent these expensive patients from receiving the care
they require.
Hillarie Levy
Simi Valley
Distraught
Wilmington dad Ervin Lupoe likely shot wife Ana and kids day before
killing self 01/28/2009
BY NANCY DILLON
DAILY NEWS WEST COAST BUREAU CHIEF
Suspected
Wilmington gunman, wife had lost jobs at Kaiser Permanente 01/27/2009
https://kaiserpapers.com/californianews/wilmingtongunman.html
Family
of CA man awarded $319K in insulin overdose
https://kaiserpapers.com/legalstuff/california-kaiser-lawsuits
Kaiser
Permanente Fresno STATEMENT OF DEFICIENCIES AND PLAN OF
CORRECTION
KAISER
INCOME
TAX STORIES
Nonprofits'
tax breaks
questioned - State probes Kaiser, Sutter
The
state is investigating 15
nonprofit healthcare organizations for
excess profits, as legislators question whether they deserve
to keep the
tax-exempt status that saves them millions of dollars a year.
The list
includes
Kaiser Foundation Hospitals, which potentially means
closer scrutiny of the healthcare giant's 30 California
hospitals, even
though a legislative hearing on the matter in Oakland last week put the
heat on Sacramento-based Sutter Health instead.
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/10527697/
mirrored at:
https://kaiserpapers.com/californianews/stateprobe.html
HOSPITAL
ERROR STORIES
Kaiser
Santa Clara
Death
of infant from hospital error probed
Victoria
Colliver, Chronicle Staff Writer
Saturday,
March 10, 2007
State
and federal authorities are investigating a medication error at Kaiser
Permanente's Santa Clara
hospital that led
to the death of an infant, Kaiser officials confirmed Friday.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/03/10/BAGILOJ3D11.DTL
mirrored for
historical
purposes at: https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/march10.html
From: http://www.kcra.com/news/9765692/detail.html
Legislation
Targets Hospital Errors
Goal
Is To Increase Public Awareness Of Medical Mistakes
POSTED:
4:33
pm PDT August 30, 2006
SACRAMENTO,
Calif. -- State
lawmakers are
working on legislation to improve hospital safety in
response
to recent
patient deaths in Northern California. State
Sen. Elaine Alquist, D-San Jose,
said she wants to pull back
what she
sees as a veil of secrecy over hospital errors.
mirrored for historical purposes at: https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/aretheyreallyerrors.html
Former
Kaiser Doctor Talks To ABC7
Claims Many
Medical Mistakes
By Debora
Villalon
From: http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=local&id=3626588
Nov. 11 -
KGO - A doctor who once worked at Kaiser Permanente in South
San Francisco claims
preventable medical mistakes
happened too often at
that hospital. He says cost-cutting moves put
patients'
lives in
danger,
and when he tried to warn Kaiser, he was fired. mirrored for
public information at: https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/abc7.html
Department
of Health Services
Sanction Against Kaiser Permanente Santa
Clara
https://kaiserpapers.com/pdfs/kaiserDHSReport.pdf
21
pages
Nov
10, 2005 5:37 pm US/Pacific
Kaiser
Inspection Records Show Signs Of Danger
Tony
Russomanno Reporting
from:
http://cbs5.com/health/local_story_314204226.html
mirrored at: https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/dangerouskaiser.html
Thu, Nov.
10, 2005
Hospitals
blamed in more
deaths
By David L.
Beck
Mercury News
Kaiser
Permanente
officials have confirmed the deaths of two more
patients
caused by staff
errors at its South Bay hospitals. The
deaths bring to
at least four the number of fatal incidents
at Kaiser
facilities during
the past 13 months.
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/13129841.htm
mirrored at:
https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/avoidkaiser.html
Wed,
Nov. 09, 2005 Kaiser
patient dies after getting wrong medication
Associated
Press
SAN
JOSE, Calif. -
A Kaiser Permanente patient
died after receiving
the wrong medication at
one of the
company's hospitals,
the second
patient
recently reported to have died under similar
circumstances
at the
facility,
state health regulators said.
from:http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/breaking_news/13124008.htm
mirrored at:
https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/kpabovethelaw.html
Nov.
08, 2005
Kaiser
confirms third
patient death
By
Julie
Sevrens Lyons -
Mercury News
Kaiser
Permanente
officials on Tuesday confirmed a third case in which
a patient at a South Bay
hospital died after a medication
error.
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/13117889.htm
text
mirrored at:
https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/thethirdone.html
November
4, 2005
‘Psyche’
patient escapes
By Bill
Silverfarb
A Kaiser
Medical Center
patient is in custody following a bizarre
incident
that left a security guard
hospitalized and a pregnant woman
traumatized.
.....“If he is mentally ill I’m more angry at the
people
that allowed it
to happen,” Singh said.
“If he was on a suicide
watch they weren’t doing
a very good job of watching him.”
http://www.smdailyjournal.com/article_preview.php?id=49612
text
mirrored at:
https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/poorsecurity.html
Please
notice the years of repeat
patterns of inappropriate behavior.
Nov.
04, 2005
In July, a
12-year-old
girl hospitalized at Kaiser Permanente Medical
Center-Santa Clara was
mistakenly given a double dose of
epinephrine,
which
speeds up the heart rate, state records show.
Josephine
Frances Hart, a San
Jose resident who
loved to play with marbles,
died July 26, the
same day of the error.
Her official cause of death is
still being investigated by the county coroner's
office,
but state
health
investigators determined that a nurse failed to check the
medication
label.
See:
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/living/health/13079133.htm
text
mirrored at:
https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/josephinehart.html
Wed,
Nov. 02, 2005
Medical
mistake may have
killed man By Julie Sevrens Lyons Mercury
News
A
21-year-old San Jose man underwent chemotherapy in August hoping
it might cure his lymphoma.
Instead, it may have killed him
-- as human
error at Kaiser Permanente's Santa Teresa Medical Center
led
to the man
being injected with the wrong medication, state investigators have
found.
Originally
Posted at:
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/living/health/13058936.htm
and mirrored
at:
https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/chemogoof.html
Widow
sues Kaiser in delivery
room tragedy - A widowed mother of two
sued the Kaiser hospital
system
alleging her husband fainted
while
helping
her give birth and fatally struck his head when
he
fell......The first
attempt to inject her failed. During the second, Passalaqua saw the
needle
enter
his wife's spine, said "here we go again," released his
wife,
lost
consciousness and fell
backwards,
hitting his head on an
aluminum cap
molding
at the base of a wall, according to the suit.
Passalaqua
suffered a fractured skull and bleeding
on the brain that
worsened and he died two
days
later, the suit said.
See story
at: https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/bumphead.html
3.3
million dollar award against Kaiser for performing heart surgery
on the
wrong patient!
A
Berkeley
man who was left nearly blind following heart bypass surgery
he did not need has been
awarded $3.3 million in one of the
largest
malpractice
decisions against Kaiser Permanente in
recent years.
https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/azari.html
Oceanside
man died after appendectomy in 2003 -
A 54-year-old Oceanside
man bled to
death after a routine appendectomy at Kaiser
Permanente Hospital
in San Diego because his doctor
made a mistake, according to
a Medical Board of California accusation filed against the doctor.
https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/paopao.html
Mother
blames Kaiser for son's death
When
Linette McCan's 7-year-old son Gregory came to her complaining
of a stomachache last
Saturday, she never dreamed
her child would be
dead
the next morning.
She
says doctors in the
emergency room at Kaiser Permanente's Walnut
Creek hospital ignored
Gregory as he suffered from
what turned out to
be
meningococcal sepsis, an infection that led to
his
death Sunday
morning.
https://kaiserpapers.com/californianews/gregorymccan.html
Demonstrations
against Kaiser Baldwin Park over death of child - The
Baby Ryan Huff
Story
https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/ryanhuff.html
People
are dying in California's hospitals because of medical errors
http://eastbay.bcentral.com/eastbay/stories/2001/07/23/focus3.html?t=printable
Kaiser
Employee Perjury Stories
SAN
FRANCISCO
Surgeon indicted on
perjury charge
He's accused of offering false alibi at
gunman's trial
Demian Bulwa, Chronicle
Staff Writer
Friday,
October 13, 2006
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/10/13/BAGVULOS931.DTL
A
San Francisco
surgeon was indicted Thursday on charges that he committed perjury
during a
federal trial in 2002 in an attempt to win an
acquittal for a
man he had sponsored in a drug
rehabilitation program.
Dr.
Bruce
Barker, a
50-year-old
physician for Kaiser Permanente, was the key witness in the
trial
of
Marvin Washington, who was accused of illegally possessing a gun
outside the Holly Courts
public housing project, where he
lived, in San
Francisco.... follow above link for complete story.
Dr.
Barker was found guilty of
perjury and
on November 2, 2007 the San Francisco Chronicle Reported:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/11/02/BASQT4UO3.DTL
Doctor
admits to perjury in trial of man he sponsored in drug rehab
Heather Knight,
Chronicle Staff Writer
Friday,
November 2, 2007
............
Prosecutors
said Barker's
account was impossible because the doctor had been performing
surgery
at the time - 4 miles away at the Kaiser
Permanente Medical Center on
Geary Boulevard. Hospital
records showed he'd been
working in the
Post-Anesthesia Care Unit until 5:35 p.m. that day.
Washington's
trial ended
when he pleaded guilty to being a
felon in
possession of a firearm and carrying
a gun with an
altered serial
number. A judge sentenced Washington to more than eight years in
prison.
The
FBI began
an
investigation into Barker's testimony. A
federal
grand jury indicted him last year on
three counts of
perjury and one
count of making a false statement to law enforcement.
Barker
pleaded
guilty to
one count of perjury on Wednesday,
admitting he knowingly and intentionally
provided
false testimony in
Washington's trial.
The
sentencing
of Barker is
scheduled for 11 a.m. Feb. 8 He
faces a
maximum of five years in prison
and a $250,000 fine.
Barker is not in
custody pending sentencing.
Kaiser
spokeswoman Meg
Walker said, "Dr. Barker does practice
here
at Kaiser Permanente in
San Francisco, and we are
reviewing this latest
development."
Read
the rest of the story at: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/11/02/BASQT4UO3.DTL
MEDICAL
BOARD, DMHC and other State Regulatory Agency STORIES
2009 - September 4 - Sponge left in patient ends in fine for
Kaiser - by Shauntel Lowe/Times-Herald, Vallejo
The
Kaiser Foundation Rehabilitation Center in Vallejo has been fined
$25,000 after staff members last year left a sponge inside a surgical
patient. The mishap
necessitated a second surgery for the patient and the removal of a
portion of her bowel.
http://www.thereporter.com/news/ci_13268617
Mirrored
for historical purposes at: https://kaiserpapers.com/californianews/sponge.html
State
regulators widen probe into Kaiser's ills
San
Francisco Business Times - November 10, 2006
by
Chris
Rauber
http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/stories/2006/11/13/story6.html?b=1163394000%5E1374648
State
health
regulators have widened a probe of Kaiser Permanente's
process
for
handling
complaints beyond its ill-fated kidney transplant unit and
into
other
operations of the health-care giant.
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/valley/la-fi-kaiser22nov22,1,4539465.story?coll=la-editions-valley
State Faults
Kaiser Doctors
Revisiting the case of
a woman whose cancer was misdiagnosed, medical
regulators decide
to
censure five more physicians. By Debora Vrana - Times Staff
Writer - November 22, 2005
The
Medical
Board of California, reversing an
earlier position, has
decided to publicly
censure all
six Kaiser Permanente doctors involved
in the death of a Woodland Hills woman whose case
has
sparked a debate
about state oversight of California's largest HMO.
Mirrored at: https://kaiserpapers.com/kaiserstillwontobeythelaw.html
October
31, 2005
Los Angeles
Attorney - B. Casey Yim, of the law firm Murchison and
Cumming accuses
Los Angeles
Times reporter of misquoting. Was
the
intent of Mr.Yim's writing to cast a shadow on the
veracity of
the
entire
article?
See: https://kaiserpapers.com/yim.html
in the
October 23, 2005 - How Many Doctors Should Be Blamed?
Originally
from:
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-newkaiser23oct23,0,1538660,print.story?coll=la-home-business
mirrored at
for public information historical purposes:
https://kaiserpapers.com/hillarieandrobyn.html
Related
story at:
http://www.simivalleyacorn.com/news/2005/1028/Community/031.html
and
https://kaiserpapers.com/robynl.html
Three
Kaiser Patient Victims Stories aired by station KEYT Santa Barbara
https://kaiserpapers.com/video/Kaiser
Permanente victims.wmv
If
using
Firefox please right
click and "Open Link In New Window"
From The
Simi Valley Acorn
http://www.simivalleyacorn.com/news/2005/1028/Community/031.html
and
https://kaiserpapers.com/acorn.html
October
28,
2005 - Simi Valley woman wants daughter’s doctors
publicly
named
for misdiagnoses
By
Michelle
Knight knight@theacorn.com
October
23, 2005 - How Many
Doctors Should Be Blamed?
Originally
from:
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-newkaiser23oct23,0,1538660,print.story?coll=la-home-business
mirrored
at
for public information historical purposes:
https://kaiserpapers.com/hillarieandrobyn.html
A
mother
whose daughter died after Kaiser physicians missed her cancer
is
fighting
to
change a law that let the HMO report only one of the
practitioners
to the state.
By
Debora
Vrana
Times
Staff
Writer
Death
sparks Simi mother's
mission
By
Adam Foxman, afoxman@VenturaCountyStar.com
Following
her daughter's death from cancer earlier this year, a Simi
Valley woman
has launched
a campaign seeking more accountability for
healthcare
providers.
Hillarie
Levy, whose
daughter Robyn Libitsky https://kaiserpapers.com/robyn.html
died
in February at age 29, has contacted state legislators in hopes of
interesting
them
in her cause.
Libitsky
died after a five-year
battle with Ewings
sarcoma, a rare form
of pediatric bone
cancer. Levy said a misdiagnosis of her daughter's
tumor
as psychosomatically induced
back pain and the later denial of certain
treatments increased her daughter's suffering and
led to her death.
April 07,
2004 - LOS ANGELES -
Kaiser Baldwin Park
Judge
suspends license of
ex-Santa Teresita nurse
Wednesday,
April 07, 2004 - LOS
ANGELES -- A judge Tuesday suspended
the license of a former
Santa Teresita Hospital nurse
accused by the
state
attorney general's office of negligence that resulted
in two
babies
being
born with severe brain damage.
Evidence
presented in the
hearing showed that nurse Vynola E. Gadsby
demonstrated a serious
disregard'' for state, California
board of
registered
nursing and hospital regulations on at least two
occasions,
said
Administrative
Law Judge H. Stuart Waxman.
To
adequately protect the
public, Waxman said Gadsby's license must
be suspended on an interim
basis, while the nursing board
proceeds with
legal proceedings to try and revoke it. Gadsby is
currently
on paid
administrative
leave from her position at Kaiser Permanente Baldwin Park Medical
Center,
according to court documents.
https://kaiserpapers.com/californianews/licensegone.html
Oceanside
man died after appendectomy in 2003 -
A 54-year-old
Oceanside
man bled to death after a routine appendectomy at Kaiser Permanente
Hospital
in San Diego because his doctor made a mistake, according to a Medical
Board
of California accusation filed against the doctor.
Kaiser
says it
will finally pay fine of $1,000,000.00 levied by Department of Managed
Health Care
in 2000./Nov. 2002
https://kaiserpapers.com/fines/kaiser1milliondollarfine.html
CORPORATE
COST SAVING WHICH RESULTED IN PATIENT
DEATH OR INJURY STORIES
$903,000
awarded to councilman's widow By
Cheryl Clark
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
August
31, 2007
SAN DIEGO
–
The late San Diego Councilman Charles Lewis was never told by his
longtime
Kaiser physician Willie Thigpen that he had a
serious liver
disease and that drinking alcohol would
hasten his death, an
arbitration judge has ruled.
June 26,
2005-
TRAGEDY AND TRAVESTY AT KAISER HOSPITAL - A letter
from
Dr. Nayvin
Gordon regarding the substandard care his daughter, a twenty
year old
San
Francisco State University student received at
Kaiser.
Were it not for the Kaiser
diluted,
overly managed, corporate cost
cutting
features of standard, accepted by the
entire
world life
saving procedures
this young lady may well have not suffered permanent
brain
damage.
Kaiser really botched this case but instead of owning up to it pulled
strings
all over the
State of California with every government agency in
existence
to not be held
accountable.
Kaiser
Cited By State for Poor Care Criticism in deaths of 2 emergency patients
Kaiser
Permanente's Walnut Creek Hospital has been cited for deficient care of
a 7-year-old
San Ramon boy and a psychiatric patient, both
of whom died
after going to its emergency room
and being transferred to
other
hospitals.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/1998/09/04/MN52892.DTL&type=printable
Kaiser
Settles Suit Alleging Denial of Care - Debora Vrana
Kaiser
Permanente has settled for an undisclosed amount a lawsuit filed
by Chant Yedalian,
a La
Crescenta man who became a lawyer to launch a
legal
crusade against the HMO to
avenge what
he alleged was the wrongful
death
of his mother.
Dr.
Robert Pearl, chief executive of Kaiser, said at a private meeting that
"we
chose not to provide our patients with what they desired,"
The
paper's
staff reviewed
Kaiser documents, including
e-mails and notes of private meetings,
and found Kaiser
encouraged its
doctors in Northern California to make themselves as unavailable
as
possible
to their patients in an effort to lower patient demand and costs.
Ebony
Howard
was
denied a needed operation at the Kaiser operating
room door.
World Class
surgeons
came forward and
helped
this young athlete receive outside of Kaiser
needed medical
care.
Story
by
Ramona
Shelburne
https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/ebony.html
Man
denied
medical
care, complaint alleges
https://kaiserpapers.com/banda.html
Kaiser
rejects
costly treatment for sick children
An
Amador County couple whose three youngsters suffer from a fatal
genetic disorder have lost
the first round of their battle
to obtain a
costly treatment that could save two of the children.
A
panel
of medical specialists from Kaiser Permanente has ruled against
John and Alicia Bennett's
request for insurance
coverage for
transplanting
healthy umbilical cord cells into their sons Hunter, 4,
and
Tommy, 2.
The
boys and
their sister,
Ciara, 6, suffer from a rare
condition known
as Sanfilippo syndrome, which
causes progressive
damage to the heart,
bones,
joints and respiratory and central nervous systems.
It
is usually fatal
by age 13.
https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/reject.html
Kaiser
Gift
Stirs Hope for 2 Ill Brothers
https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/brothers.html
Because
of a
$1-million
research donation from Kaiser
Permanente, two
Amador County boys with
a rare genetic disease may
soon get
experimental
transplants that offer the only chance to save their
lives.
Kaiser,
the
state's largest HMO, had refused for months to pay
for umbilical
cord-blood transplants
for Hunter Bennett, 4, and
his 2-year-old
brother,
Tommy. Their 6-year-old sister, Ciara, also has the
disease,
but is not
eligible for the transplant because the illness has progressed too far.
The
HMO argued
that the transplants themselves
could be life-threatening
and had not been proved
to work. But, after an
onslaught of media
coverage,
Kaiser agreed to donate $1 million to Duke
University
in North Carolina
for research into the children's condition, known as Sanfilippo
syndrome.
Duke can use the money to cover the boys'
medical costs there.
Technically,
the HMO's decision does not set a precedent or
change its
position on covering the
experimental treatment--but
it allows the
family
to pursue its only hope.
HMO
benefit reductions put seniors at risk
https://kaiserpapers.com/ventura.html
SF
Times
Article on how Kaiser legally murders patients
License
to kill
Hospitals
reserve the right to pull your plug
Wesley
J. Smith
Sunday,
December 2, 2001
Originally
posted at: http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-010202kaiser.story
Cases Reveal
Lapses in Kaiser
Emergency Care
Health: Nine
arbitration proceedings offer a rare look into HMO. It
denies any pattern of negligence.
By CHARLES
ORNSTEIN
Times Health
Writer
https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/arby.html
Fools'
rush
in after cancer shock
https://kaiserpapers.com/foolcan.html
Infant
Anesthesia
Problems Spark Debate - Feb. 2003
https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/debate.html
Infant
Anesthesia Problems Spark Debate
By
Charles
Ornstein, Times Staff Writer
February
24,
2003
The
soul-searching among
anesthesiologists at Kaiser Permanente's Woodland
Hills hospital
began in 1999, after 2-month-old Grant Wray
nearly died
as he was being sedated for hernia
surgery.
Doubts
grew the following year when 19-month-old Jose Fajardo III suffered
throat spasms during
anesthesia, then died.
General
anesthesiologists at Woodland Hills questioned whether they
could safely care for
children so young; they implored
hospital leaders
to send these patients elsewhere or hire
pediatric
specialists.
Hospital
administrators
said the two cases were aberrations
and strongly
defended using
general anesthesiologists for pediatric
surgeries. They
did, however, make some changes,
such as enlisting
neonatologists, who
specialize in caring for newborns, to help sedate the
youngest
infants.
Kaiser
settles family's lawsuitHis parents blame the
hospital for their son's permanent disability
after birth.
By
Ramon Coronado --
Bee Staff Writer - (Published
October 10, 2002)
A
Kaiser
hospital in Sacramento
has agreed to pay $2.25 million to settle
a lawsuit alleging its
staff neglected to tell a Carmichael
couple
their
newborn son had a treatable medical condition
that
later injured him
permanently.
https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/coronado.html
High
Court OKs Reduced Malpractice Sum in Girl's Death
State's
$250,000 limit applies in suit over hospital `dumping'
Harriet
Chiang, Chronicle Legal Affairs Writer
Friday,
March 26, 1999
She arrived
at 5:30 p.m.
and was examined by a staff physician, Dr.
Trach Phoung Dang, who
wanted to do blood tests to determine
whether
she
had a bacterial infection. But a doctor at
Kaiser Permanente
Hospital
told
him not to do so, saying that the tests could wait until she was
transferred
to Kaiser. The girl was enrolled in Kaiser's health plan.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/1999/03/26/MN102692.DTL
(Copyright,
The Times Mirror Company; Los
Angeles Times 1997all Rights reserved)
Federal
investigators have released a critical report detailing
patient-care problems at Kaiser
Permanente's hospitals in
Oakland
and Richmond discovered during a surprise inspection in
March.
The
inspection followed reports of deaths of three patients
transferred from Kaiser's
Richmond hospital last
winter. Among
the
report's
findings were inexplicable delays in transferring
patients,
short
staffing and inadequate quality-control procedures. Kaiser,
which
faced
the possible
loss of federal funding at the two hospitals,
has
taken corrective actions, said officials of the U.S.
Health
Care
Financing
Administration. A follow-up inspection is scheduled in the next several
weeks.
(Copyright,
The Times Mirror Company; Los Angeles Times 1997all Rights reserved)
Three
HMOs--Kaiser
Permanente, Pacificare and
Health Systems
International--will soon control
health care for 9
million of the 13
million Californians in HMOs. Kaiser is singular among these
titans
in
receiving an annual tax break of more than $200 million because of its
nonprofit status.
Such status requires the provision
of charity care,
but does not preclude Kaiser from diverting
profits
to the doctors who
own Kaiser's for-profit medical group and receive dividends
for
Kaiser's penny-pinching.
While
Kaiser
was once the
gold standard
for affordable, high-quality HMO care, it has recently
led
the race to
the bottom in health quality, clinging to its tax break even as it acts
like a for-profit
company. Kaiser has been the
leader in reducing
patient stays and has steadily cut back on
preventive
services by
limiting mammograms, pap smears and prostate cancer screenings.
An
infamous
Kaiser memo
announcing an eight-hour
discharge
policy for
newborns and their mothers
(since outlawed) was
called "Positive
Thoughts Regarding the Eight Hour Discharge." It encouraged
staff
to
offer such justifications as "hospital food is not tasty" and
"unlimited visitors Authorities
investigate
allegations that a Kaiser surgeon in San
Luis Obispo
hastened a possible donor's demise.at home."
The
state
Department
of
Corporations, which oversees HMOs, has done an audit of Kaiser,
released
in August, and found that medical decisions
at Kaiser do not
appear to be "independent of fiscal and
administrative
considerations."
In other words, money is dictating medicine. This is against the law.
Specifically,
auditors
found that "clinical
financial review
nurses
have the authority to overrule physician
decisions."
Bureaucrats can,
in effect, practice medicine without a license. The auditors also found
that
25% of non-network emergency room treatment for
Kaiser members was
denied unreasonably.
Kaiser
has been
ordered to
answer for these
abuses by February, but it will no doubt resist. Kaiser's
own
1995-97
Southern California strategic plan, which includes such reckless
care-cutting as replacing
skilled nurses with
unskilled attendants, is
based on a financial goal that amounts to being able to quote
the
lowest price to all corporate and individual purchasers. Prevention,
which used to be the signature
of HMOs, is barely
mentioned in the
document, which reads more like a corporate prospectus than a
plan
for
health policy. This "nonprofit" company has made more than $2 billion
in net operating income,
i.e. profit, over the last
three years. Today
Kaiser spends $60 million annually on advertising and
marketing,
more
than a 700% increase over four years ago.
While
the state has
tried to resolve cases with Kaiser and other HMOs "quietly," only a
forceful and
public response will prevent the kind
of reckless
indifference that threatens patients like Charla Cooper.
Cooper
will
lose her ability to have children if Kaiser does not provide $70,000 in
specialist care,
available only outside the Kaiser
network, that she
requires for a pre-cancerous cervical condition
and
ovarian
complications. HMOs like Kaiser do not like to provide such
out-of-network care, even
when no qualified
specialist exists at the
HMO, because of cost.
Cooper
has
stated: "Kaiser
missed a
diagnosis, did not return my phone calls, scheduled procedures
three
months after they were needed and returned test results up to two
months after the tests were
performed." Fertility
specialists whose
advice Cooper sought on her own have urged that she receive
special
surgery and fertility treatment unavailable at Kaiser, but Kaiser
bureaucrats have steadfastly
refused to authorize
such treatment.
Cooper's chances of becoming a mother fade every day. Her
complaint,
marked "urgent" by department investigators in July, is still sitting
on the desk of Department
of Corporations
Commissioner Keith Bishop.
Bishop
has
charted a
harmfully cautious course
with HMOs since
his
appointment by Gov. Wilson.
And indeed, the
Department of Corporations
has issued only one fine in its 20 years of HMO oversight
for
improper
denial of health care. But HMOs like Kaiser understand money most, and
that is what they
must be forced to pay when they
violate state law and
abandon patients like Cooper. The penalty
should be
enough to give a
billion-dollar behemoth an incentive to live up to its obligations
under the
law and its debt to taxpayers who
underwrite that
$200-million annual bonus.
Credit:
Jamie Court is the director of Consumers
for Quality Care, a
Los Angeles-based watchdog group
(Copyright,
The
Times Mirror Company; Los Angeles Times 1996 all Rights reserved)
November 21, 1996
My
thanks to Ellen Goodman for "The Latest HMO Outrage: Drive-Thru
Mastectomy" (Commentary,
Nov. 18). Last week I
became an uninformed
victim of this inhumane practice at Kaiser-Permanente,
Los
Angeles.
I
want to acquaint women with my firsthand experience of this degradation
and urge my fellow HMO
patients to contact their Washington
legislators.
My
mastectomy and lymph node removal took place at 7:30 a.m., Nov. 13. I
was released at 2:30 p.m.
that same day. I received
notice, the day
before surgery, from my doctor that mastectomy was an
outpatient
procedure at Kaiser and I'd be released the same day. Shocked by this
news, I told my
surgeon of my previous complications
with anesthesia
and the fact that I have a cervical spine
condition,
which adds an
additional consideration for any surgery. The pleasant doctor
assured
me that I'd be admitted, for the night, if I
experienced excessive pain
or nausea. This was noted
in my chart.
In
the
recovery room and
the holding area, I felt like a wounded soldier in a hospital tent
during the
Civil War. I was surrounded by moaning
patients and placed
directly next to a screaming infant.
When I finally
found a voice, I
shouted, "Get me out of here!" A nurse flitted by, shot me a
disapproving
glance, and commented, "Some folks just
don't know when to
be grateful." This was the ultimate humiliation.
While
in a
groggy, postoperative daze, swimming in pain and nausea, I was given
some perfunctory
instructions on how to empty the
two bloody drains
attached to my body. I was told to dress myself
and
go home. My
doctor's written chart instructions for a room assignment, if I
developed acute nausea
or pain, were ignored by the
nursing staff.
Obviously, the reassurance had been given to placate me at
the
time of
my discussion with the doctor but everyone knew an overnight stay was
against Kaiser
hospital rules. Everyone knew, except
me. I had no time
to mourn the loss of my breast or regain a
sense of
composure.
This
experience was especially shocking because four years previously, I had
undergone a hysterectomy
and received excellent
treatment and a
four-night stay at the very same Kaiser facility.
We
women can
allow ourselves to be discounted or we can demand more from the HMOs.
No civilized
country in the world has mastectomy as
an outpatient
procedure.
VICTORIA
BERCK
Los
Angeles
*
In
Goodman's
excellent column, every word of which I endorse wholeheartedly, she
quotes
Cindy Pearson of the National Women's Health
Network as implying
that women receive second-
class medical treatment just
because of their
sex, by asking, "What part of a man's body would
they
amputate in
same-day surgery?" I can answer that one from experience: the
testicle(s).
When
I had my testicle removed for
testicular cancer
it was admittedly not as serious a surgery
as
radical mastectomy, but
it did involve general anesthesia, surgery and the loss of a body
part
to which I was deeply attached. And it was only
covered as outpatient
surgery by my HMO, male
though I be (still).
MICHEL
MASSON
Santa
Barbara
DAY
OF MOURNING, PROTESTS
-
Julian
Guthrie, OF THE EXAMINER STAFF
Saturday,
December 2, 1995
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/e/a/1995/12/02/NEWS1071.dtl
ACT
UP
Golden Gate held simultaneous noontime rallies in San Francisco
and Oakland calling
on Kaiser Permanente to improve care for HIV
patients.
MEDICAL
RECORDS
This
article is from the San
Francisco Chronicle from 2003 and written
by David Lazarus.
The title is Medical
Charts Not All That Private. http://tinyurl.com/dvffc I
think that today with the
rush to outsource everything the
warnings in
this article are even more important to heed.
So
much for the great Kaiser computer system. They can't even
track who writes
what prescriptions.!
KTVU - Fox
Network
A Danville
couple whose
two children were killed by a hit-and-run
driver
wants new controls on
how doctors prescribe drugs. Bob and
Carmen say
Kaiser
permanente shares the death of their
two children. A woman
charged with
being drunk when she hit and killed the children back in 2003.
The
Packs
believe Baretta was under the influence of painkillers at the time
prescribed
by several
different Kaiser doctors.
The
month of the accident, a Kaiser doctor prescribed 50 vicadin pills
without
knowing
that six days earlier another doctor gave her 50 prescriptions
for 50 pills.
updates
to this story:
http://www.ktvu.com/news/4516615/detail.html
April
27, 2005
- Hit-And-Run Nanny Sentenced To 30 Years To Life
http://www.ktvu.com/news/4422543/detail.html
Regulators
Fine Kaiser Unit $200,000 - June 21, 2005
The state imposes the penalty for breaching patient confidentiality
in exposing health records
on the Web. by
Debra Vrana - Times Staff
Writer
Nonprofit
health council sues Kaiser over medical disclosures
The
California
Consumer Health
Care Council has sued
the Kaiser Foundation over what it says is
inappropriate
disclosure of
private medical records.
The
council contends
that when Kaiser learns of a suit
or potential suit by a patient, its legal
department
opens and studies
that patient's private medical records without notifying the
patient.
This
alleged review by Kaiser's legal department is inappropriate, said
the council, because Kaiser's
legal
employees have no role in the patient's
health care.
"If
a patient has a
claim against Kaiser for negligently
cutting off a little finger, why should a clerk in
Kaiser's
legal
department
be able to review the patient's entire medical file,
which might
include
information on unrelated sexual, psychiatric
or personal problems ...?"
asked Martin Blake, one of
the lawyers who
filed the suit in Alameda
County
Superior Court for the council on Monday.
John
Metz, the
chairman of the council, said that Kaiser
has put its own legal interests above the
protection
of its patients'
privacy.
"It is just wrong," he said in a statement
Internal
Kaiser letter regarding inaccurate patient charts
http://www.welchco.com/03/00050/60/99/11/3001.HTM
Software
glitch reveals
stranger's health history
Kaiser
applicant sees woman's information
Victoria
Colliver, Chronicle Staff Writer
Friday,
March 12, 2004
When Joe
Carroll applied
for health care coverage online with Kaiser
Permanente,
he was surprised when a completed application for an Oregon
woman suddenly popped
up on his screen.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2004/03/12/BUGND5J3PR1.DTL
http://www.ktvu.com/news/4422543/detail.htm
Kaiser
Patients Are Billed in
the Street
- Peter
Sinton, Chronicle Senior Writer
Saturday,
September 19, 1998
If
Kaiser
Permanente is your health care provider
and you live in Petaluma
or other
North Bay spots, your bill may be a little late this month.
A
box of 1,200 September account statements sent
by Kaiser's Southern
California
data processing center to its direct mail company somehow
ended
up all over the
streets of San Francisco yesterday.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/1998/09/19/BU70537.DTL
PATIENT
DISEASE RELATED TO UNCLEAN PRACTICES AT
HOSPITALS OR
UNSTERILIZED EQUIPMENT
Some
Kaiser
patients positive for hep - April 9, 2005
Equipment
wasn't sterile but may not have been source of hepatitis
There have
been "a small number" of positive hepatitis test results
from Kaiser patients who
were alerted that
unsterilized equipment was
used
during procedures in South Sacramento
and Redwood
City, a hospital
official
said Friday.
https://kaiserpapers.com/kpgvethemhep.html
More
than 3,000
Kaiser patients are at risk for hepatitis Females alerted to
un-sanitized
equipment
that hospitals used.
By
MATTHIAS
GAFNI
https://kaiserpapers.com/californianews/sendkpsoap.html
Kaiser
sued in instrument scare
A
class-action lawsuit was filed Monday in Sacramento Superior Court
on behalf of more
than 1,000 Kaiser Permanente patients who
may have
been
exposed to contaminated instruments.
https://kaiserpapers.com/legalstuff/soupy.html
SACRAMENTO
- Kaiser
Permanente has notified 1,331 patients that
procedures performed
on them at a Sacramento-area hospital may have been done with
contaminated instruments.
- April 29, 2004
Kaiser
Permanente officials seek third-floor patients for TB skin tests
Kaiser
Permanente Medical Center South Sacramento is tracking down
1,300 patients who
may have had contact with a nurse
recently diagnosed
with tuberculosis. - March 26, 2004
SARAH
NOME STORIES - ELDERLY PATIENT EVICTED
FROM KAISER HOSPITAL
Kaiser to
auction
former patient's home
to pay bill
By Nancy Isles
Nation
MEDIANEWS
The
house of a woman who refused to leave her hospital bed at Kaiser
Permanente for
more than a year will be auctioned by the
Marin County
sheriff's office Tuesday.
If
the home at 77 Alder Ave. in San Anselmo sells, the proceeds will be
used to cover the
bill for a 14-month hospital stay by
former resident
Sarah Nome, who now lives at the
Lafayette Convalescent
Hospital .
The
cost to Kaiser was $1.4 million based on the $3,200 per-day price
for the hospital bed,
according to a court ruling.
Kaiser
has not determined the value of the house because officials have
not had access to
the property, but it is believed to be in
substantial
disrepair.
mirrored for historical purposes at: https://kaiserpapers.com/californianews/outinthestreet.html
ROOM
502 - SAN ANSELMO KAISER HOSPITAL - Woman, 82,
Refuses to Leave Kaiser
Hospital in California After Being Discharged a Year Ago,
Racking
Up $1 Million in Bills- By BRIAN SKOLOFF Associated Press
Writer
-
This is one very brave lady!
Final
update
on Room 502 - 82-year-old woman who refused to leave hospital
placed
in
Marin County guardian's care and shipped off to a home.
Eviction
Day for Sarah Nome news coverage
Kaiser
losing patience with patient By
Nancy
Isles Nation
San Anselmo
firebrand
Sarah Nome, often at odds with City Hall, now
is taking on
Kaiser Permanente from her
hospital bed.
KAISER LOST
BODIES STORIES
Kaiser
not
forthcoming over mix-up at morgue -
Kaiser tried to cover up
a missing
Priest's body replacing a elderly woman's for a cremation!
ALAMEDA
COUNTY
Couple Claim
Hospital
Lost Baby's Remains
-
Wednesday,
April 21, 1999
Oakland
-- Oakland
couple has filed a lawsuit
against Kaiser Permanente
Hospital
claiming that the HMO lost the body of their stillborn
daughter.
URL: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/1999/04/21/MNR3BA6.DTL
Kaiser
Apologizes For Burial Mix-Up
Three
Infants Mistakenly Buried Together
POSTED:
7:16 pm PDT May 23, 2006
http://www.kcra.com/money/9264342/detail.html
Mirrored
at: https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/kaiserlostbodies.html
ARBITRATION
STORIES
Lacking
lawyers, justice is denied
Attorneys
often avoid medical malpractice suits because California limits 'pain
and suffering' awards to $250,000.
By
Daniel Costello, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
December 29, 2007
Dave
Stewart's 72-year-old mother went to Stanford University Medical
Center for double knee-replacement surgery in April. Four days later,
she was dead.
To Stewart,
an anesthesiologist, it seemed a classic case of medical
malpractice. After the operation, his mother developed sharp abdominal
pain that she described as "10 on a scale of 1 to 10," according to her
medical records.
Read more at:
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-malpractice29dec29,1,2913626.story?coll=la-headlines-business&ctrack=1&cset=true
Hard
Time For Kaiser Patients To Get Day In Court
http://cbs5.com/local/local_story_244205451.htmlSeptember
1, 2006 - CBS5 San
Francisco
Reporter Anna Werner(CBS
5) Getting out
of bed is hard for
John Pellini. He can barely walk.
"The whole
body, my shoulder my
hands, everything aches," Pellini said.
He even
needs help breathing.
For John's family it's a 24/7 job.
"I feel
guilty because I have
always been the type of person to do things by myself," Pellini said.
John's
family said he could walk fine just over a year ago, when he checked
into the emergency
room at Kaiser in Hayward, complaining of a pain in
his leg. A few days later, it became even worse.
mirrored for historical purposes at: https://kaiserpapers.com/pellini.html
Arbitration
provider breaks with HMOs, saying it will no longer handle such
cases unless
both sides agree
to the
out-of-court process.
https://kaiserpapers.com/2b.html
Kaiser
Arbitration May Be Unenforceable, Says Unfair Business Competition Case
Finalized
Today
"Kaiser
broke
California law
by forcing patients into
secret arbitration proceedings without
fully and properly
disclosing
that
they had given up their rights. Today's filing closes the door
on
the HMO's
illegal actions. The unfair business competition law was the only tool
I had to
hold Kaiser accountable for its deception. With
today's
resolution
of the case, Kaiser should
take back the donation it made to
the anti-
patient initiative and stop its efforts to restrict
patients'
rights,"
Kaiser
and Arbitration in California
http://www.rescuehealthcareday.com/arbitration.htm
Kaiser
loses ruling in death
of newborn
http://www.pe.com/localnews/stories/PE_NEWS_nkaiser28.58021.html
mirrored and preserved at: https://kaiserpapers.com/californianews/newborn.html
Kaiser
loses
ruling in death of newborn
ARBITRATION: An attorney says the doctor used standard procedures to
treat
the birth defect.
12/28/2002
By
DOUGLAS E. BEEMAN
THE PRESS-ENTERPRISE
A
Murrieta couple has won a $1 million
arbitration case against Kaiser
Permanente stemming
from the death of their newborn
daughter nearly
three
years ago. An arbitrator ruled that the
doctor who
performed the
surgery
to repair a birth defect used poor judgment when complications
arose
after
the operation.
Under
California's law limiting
general damages in medical liability
cases, the award was reduced
to $250,000.
The couple,
Rachelle and Leon Phillips, say the award is small
compensation
for the loss of their child.
More important, Rachelle
Phillips said, is
that Kaiser has been held responsible for its error that cost
Renea
Phillips
her life.
KAISER
EMPLOYEE MOLESTER STORIES
Background on Scott Takasugi
saved from The Permanente Medical Group before they removed it.
https://kaiserpapers.com/takasugi3.html
http://www.kcra.com/news/9379863/detail.html
Accused
Doctor
Makes First Court Appearance
Attorney
Questions Kaiser's Failure To Act
SACRAMENTO,
Calif. -- A
plastic surgeon
charged with sexually exploiting his patients and
stockpiling military
weapons in his Carmichael home made his first court appearance on
Thursday.In a civil lawsuit filed Thursday, an attorney for one of
Takasugi's
alleged victims
reports suspicious conduct by the doctor dating back to
2001. READ More -
mirrored for
historical purposes at: https://kaiserpapers.com/takasugi2.html
http://www.sacbee.com/content/news/story/14267935p-15079484c.html
Surgeon
is held on weapons, sex charges
By
Carrie Peyton Dahlberg and Christina Jewett -- Bee Staff Writers
Published
8:27 pm PDT Wednesday, June 14, 2006
A
Carmichael plastic surgeon was being held on sex and weapons charges
Wednesday
after police found an armor-penetrating rocket launcher,
machine guns and dozens of other
weapons in his sprawling ranch home.
Dr.
Scott Takasugi, known by neighbors for his lavish Halloween
parties, dapper clothes
and luxury car collection, was being
investigated for sexual exploitation of patients when
the cache was
found.
Complete
story at above link and mirrored for historical purposes at:
https://kaiserpapers.com/rocketlauncher.html
Jun
14, 2006 12:00 am US/Pacific
http://cbs13.com/topstories/local_story_165145914.html
Kaiser
Statement Regarding Arrest Of Dr. Takasugi
(CBS
13) SACRAMENTO Kaiser Permanente released
the
following statement
regarding
the arrest of Dr. Scott Takasugi on charges of sexually
expoiting a patient.
"After
receiving patient care
complaints, we contacted the sheriff's
department and have
cooperated fully with their investigation. We
encouraged the patients to file police reports
as well. We have begun
the process to terminate the physician and to report him to the
medical
board.
mirrored
for historical purposes at: https://kaiserpapers.com/takasugi.html
IMPROPER
PROCEDURES FOLLOWED IN PELVIC EXAMS, SIX WOMEN ALLEGE
-
Feb.
19,
2003
https://kaiserpapers.com/raul3.html
Raul's
Trial Begins - February 16, 2003
https://kaiserpapers.com/raul2.html
RAUL
GALINDO IXTLAHUAC - KP OB/GYN Doctor molester of numerous female
patients
https://kaiserpapers.com/raul.html
Further
Update - March 14,2003
https://kaiserpapers.com/raulmarch.html
DA
may add another sex charge
https://kaiserpapers.com/rauljuly.html
Kaiser
Male Nurse pleads not guilty to four sexual battery charges
January 21,
2005
A male nurse
who has
cared for patients at hospitals in San Diego and
North County
for a decade pleaded not guilty yesterday to four felony
counts
of sexual battery on medically
incapacitated people.
Julius
Ariston
Villareal, 32, of Chula Vista is accused of fondling
and committing other sex
acts on two men in their hospital beds who
were
drugged and unable to resist.
San
Diego Union-Tribune, The (CA)
August 20, 2005
Estimated
printed pages: 1
A nurse who cared
for patients at hospitals in San Diego and North County has been
convicted
of six counts of sexual battery for
fondling several
patients.
A Superior Court jury Wednesday found
Julius
Ariston Villareal,
32, of Chula Vista guilty of
sexually touching three male
patients in
September 2003 and June 2004. He could be sentenced
to up to
nine years
in prison at a court hearing scheduled for Sept. 20. He is free on
$50,000 bail.
Prosecutors say the incidents occurred
at Sharp Coronado Hospital and Healthcare Center and
Kaiser
Foundation
Hospital in San Diego. He was fired from both hospitals after the
patients
complained.
Villareal
was also fired from a nursing job at Scripps Memorial Hospital
Encinitas in 1996 after
he was accused of similar acts. He
did not face
charges in connection with that incident because
the statute
of
limitations had run out, a prosecutor said.
Edition:
1,2,6,7
Section:
LOCAL
Page: B-2
Column: AROUND
THE REGION
Index
Terms: CRIME; HOSPITALS; SAN
DIEGO; SEX; TRIALS; VERDICTS
Copyright
2005
Union-Tribune Publishing Co.
San
Diego Union-Tribune, The (CA)
November 9, 2005
Author: Dana
Littlefield; STAFF WRITER
Estimated
printed pages: 2
A nurse convicted of fondling
patients
at two local hospitals was sentenced yesterday to 240
days
in jail and
placed on three years' probation.
A jury found Julius
Ariston Villareal,
33, of Chula Vista guilty Aug. 17 of six counts of sexual
battery
on an
unconscious person for inappropriately touching three male patients. He
had worked
as a licensed vocational nurse at hospitals in
San Diego and
North County for a decade.
San Diego Superior Court
Judge Peter C. Deddeh also ordered Villareal to work 20 days in public
work service and register as a sex offender for the rest of
his life.
Villareal,
who had been free on $50,000 bail, was taken into custody immediately
after the hearing.
Deputy
Attorney General David Songco said the incidents occurred at Sharp
Coronado Hospital
and Healthcare Center and Kaiser
Foundation Hospital
in San Diego between September 2003
and June 2004. Villareal
was fired
from both hospitals after the patients complained.
He
was also fired
from a nursing job at Scripps Memorial Hospital Encinitas in 1996 after
he was
accused of similar acts. However, he did not face
charges in
connection with that incident because
the statute of
limitations had
run out, Songco said.
According to court
documents, a 28-year-old patient who had been admitted to Sharp
Coronado for
severe pneumonia reported that Villareal
touched his
genitals twice during sponge baths and also
sexually
propositioned him.
The
victim did not immediately report the incident because he was
embarrassed, according to
court documents.
Another
male patient who was treated for an infected dog bite at Kaiser told
authorities that Villareal
sexually touched him on several
occasions
during his hospital stay last year. A third patient, also from
Kaiser,
came forward after seeing news reports of Villareal's arrest.
All
of the patients told authorities they were heavily medicated when the
incidents occurred.
Villareal
repeatedly denied the accusations to his employers and investigators,
according to court
documents. He told a probation officer
that his
immediate goal after the sentencing hearing was to
get a job.
The
prosecutor said he plans to immediately initiate proceedings to revoke
Villareal's nursing
license.
Dana
Littlefield: (619)
542-4590; dana.littlefield@uniontrib.com
Edition:
1,7
Section: LOCAL
Page: B-3
Index Terms: ABUSE; CRIME;
FIRINGS;
HOSPITALS; MEDICINE;
SAN
DIEGO; SENTENCES;
SEX;
TRIALS
Copyright
2005 Union-Tribune Publishing Co.
Record
Number: UTS1911355
Jay
Tibbles Sex offender history since 1975- still KP MD
http:/kaiserpapers.com/californianews/kpwierdo.html
Dr.
Jay Tibbles, M.D. -
Pediatrition that specialized
in molestation
cases at Kaiser Permanente Fontana
As
of April 8, 2002 Dr. Jay Harold Tibbles,
of Fontana, California convicted of six feloney counts of
unlawful
attempt to commit lewd acts with a child and five felony counts of
unlawful
attempt to send
harmful matter to a child under 14 years of
age with
intent
to seduce the child. License revoked.
Effective,
April 8.
Former
Kaiser Internist Gets
Year for Sex Charge Chronicle Staff Report
Wednesday,
February 7, 2001
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2001/02/07/MNC110209.DTL
The FBI
learned in March 1998 that Jacobson, a former Kaiser internist
in Milpitas, had
spoken of having sex with young girls, authorities
said.
An undercover agent tape-recorded
telephone calls in which Jacobson
arranged
for the agent, posing as a "madam," to find an
11-year-old girl for his
sexual purposes, authorities said.
Kaiser's
Dirty Little Secret - Kaiser Bellflower - Dr. Peter
Fischer by Susan Goldsmith
https://kaiserpapers.com/co/dirtylit.html
Kaiser
Permanente Hospital Officials were warned twice that
pediatrician
Dr. Peter Fischer
was molesting his boy patients. And they
let him
keep doing it.
RH
doctor faces sex charges -
Sampras' former coach accused of
molestation
Daily Breeze (Torrance, CA)
July 18, 1997
Author: The
Associated
Press
A doctor
from Rolling Hills who
once coached tennis star Pete Sampras faces 16 charges of
molesting
boys he met through his medical practice, authorities confirmed
Thursday.
The
allegations against Dr.
Peter Fischer,
a pediatric endocrinologist,
involve four boys who
were 13 to 15 years old at the time,
said Deputy
District Attorney Eloise Phillips.
https://kaiserpapers.com/californianews/peterfischer.html
SAMPRAS'
EX-COACH IN TROUBLE
Times
Union, The (Albany, NY)
July 23,
1997
Author: Associated Press
DOWNEY,
Calif. -- A doctor and former coach of tennis star Pete Sampras was
ordered
Tuesday to stand trial on charges that he
molested young male
patients.
After a preliminary hearing that included testimony from the alleged
victims, a Downey Municipal
Court judge ruled
prosecutors have enough
evidence to proceed with the case against
Dr. Peter
Fischer.
Fischer,
who is free on $460,000
bail, was ordered to appear Thursday in Norwalk Superior
Court
for
arraignment.
In a
separate case filed in February, Fischer, a pediatric
endocrinologist from Rolling Hills, is
charged with three
counts of
committing a lewd act on a child and three counts of penetration
by
a
foreign object.
HOSPITALIZATION
CUTTING STORIES
Kaiser
struggles to
cut cost of care
- Lisa M. Krieger, EXAMINER MEDICAL WRITER
Monday, September 25, 1995
CALIFORNIA
-- Kaiser Permanente,
once the
undisputed leader in low-cost
health care, is
struggling to stay competitive by hospitalizing fewer
patients
and rewarding cost-effective
doctors, internal documents
show.
"We're
competing in
a very hot market," said David
Pockell, executive
vice president and
regional manager of the Kaiser's Northern California
region.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/e/a/1995/09/25/BUSINESS9917.dtl
Kaiser
Dumps Bonus Plan
Program
rewarded doctors
for containing medical costs
Carl T.
Hall, Chronicle Staff Writer
Wednesday,
December 20, 1995
The giant
Oakland-based HMO denied the move was intended to placate
critics of the
bonus plan, who had said the system essentially rewarded
doctors for rationing care.
Instead, officials said the budgetary goals
were met for 1995 -- so the incentives were
not necessary for 1996.
In
Northern California, Kaiser
doctors operate
under a different incentive
program. It includes
modest bonuses to physicians if the facility where
they work meets certain budget and quality
goals.
The giant
Oakland-based HMO denied the move was intended to placate
critics of the bonus
plan, who had said the system essentially rewarded
doctors for rationing care. Instead, officials
said the budgetary goals
were met for 1995 -- so the incentives were not necessary for 1996.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/1995/12/20/BU72074.DTL
MA
BARKLEY: Kaiser Permanente is
best known for its health care, but
when it comes to
building its new San Francisco medical center, it
seems
some of its advisers are . . . well,
ready to kill.
At
least that's the
impression staffers got when
they heard Kaiser attorney
Alice Barkley's
voice- mail message to San Francisco's city planning
office,
warning that if she didn't like the
agency's forthcoming environmental
ruling on Kaiser's Geary Street project, ``you may have a
staff that is
dead by tomorrow.''
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/1996/09/27/MN72628.DTL
Kaiser
Denies Charges by L.A.
Group
- Carl T.
Hall, Peter Sinton, Chronicle Staff Writers
Wednesday,
September 27, 1995
A
Los Angeles group
called Consumers for Quality
Care, interpreting
a Kaiser business
plan, charged that the HMO plans to dramatically
reduce
the number of patients hospitalized,
limit prescriptions of high-cost
drugs
and continue to prescribe more medication, apparently in
lieu of needed
treatment.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/1995/09/27/BU11469.DTL
KAISER
AND
DHS/HHS/CMS STORIES
Kaiser Told
to Reinstate Coverage
Originally
Posted at:
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-kaiser19oct19,1,3274480.story?coll=la-headlines-business
&track=crosspromo
Regulators'
action in a kidney patient's case comes as scrutiny over cancellations
grows.
By Lisa
Girion
Times Staff
Writer
October 19,
2006
State
regulators for the
first time have ordered a health plan to reinstate the insurance
coverage
of a patient whose policy was ruled to have been
illegally
canceled.
In
an order posted Wednesday, the Department of Managed Health Care ruled
that Kaiser
Foundation Health Plan illegally canceled
coverage for a
Northern California woman in urgent
need of medical
attention for large
kidney stones. The cancellation was illegal, the agency ruled,
because
there was no evidence the woman intended to deceive the health
maintenance organization
about her medical history.
https://kaiserpapers.com/californianews/oct192006.html
Kaiser
answers state complaints By Richard Halstead IJ reporter
Sunday,
December 26, 2004 - State inspectors discovered dirty shower
rooms and patios fouled
by bird
droppings when they visited Kaiser
Permanente
Medical Center in San Rafael last September. -
Vickie's
comment on this
article - All patients should take photographs of unsanitary conditions
at
Kaiser and
present copies to their local Health Departments,
Newspapers
and any other entity they
can think of
to get those places cleaned up.
California
DHS Director becomes Kaiser Stooge
Oct. 21,
2004--Diana M. Bonta, R.N., Dr.P.H., former Director of the
California Department
of Health Services, has assumed the newly created
position of Vice President of Public Affairs
for Kaiser Permanente's
Southern
California Region. Is this a reward for something you did
Diana?
https://kaiserpapers.com/californianews/dianabonta.html
Kaiser
hospice program may lose Medicare funding
Kaiser
Hospice Under Threat of Losing Medicare Funding San Francisco Chronicle
Kaiser
Fined
for Phlebotomy Practices, Policies; Safety Needles Called Ineffective
Kaiser
gets out of paying $1,000,000 fine to DMHC
Kaiser
fined Half a Million Dollars by DMHC in California for death of 19 year
old
Kaiser
Agrees
to Pay Fine for Care Lapse
Kaiser
Permanente, under investigation in California for requiring
psychiatrists
to write drug
prescriptions
for mental health patients whom they have
not
seen, on Thursday defended its
practice
as "team-based."
Kaiser
says
they will finally pay the $1,000,000 fine levied in 2000
Several
Claims Against Kaiser Dropped By State
LA
Times takes a stand - Utterback Case
Attorney
general to probe Kaiser for donations to governor
Experiments
on
Humans Business of clinical trials soars, but risks unknown
June
13, 2001 California Attorney General to probe Kaiser for funds to Davis
Kaiser
Given Deadline on
Patient Waits
Saturday,
January 31,
1998
Walnut Creek --
Kaiser Permanente has 10 days
to correct long emergency room
waits that may have contributed to the
death
of an 84-year-old man in December, a
state health regulator said
yesterday.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/1998/01/31/MNR6CO11.DTL
Nurses
protest federal
reapproval of Kaiser
-
Eric
Brazil, OF THE
EXAMINER STAFF
Wednesday,
July 23, 1997
Kaiser nurses,
regrouping after a two-day strike
last week at Kaiser-Permanente
Northern California hospitals and
clinics,
have fired off a letter protesting the findings
of a study that cleared
the big health maintenance organization to continue as an
East Bay
Medicare
provider.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/e/a/1997/07/23/NEWS2690.dtl
KAISER
PROFITS AND PRICE GOUGING STORIES
California's
Kaiser Foundation Health Plan, reported a $38.9 million,
or 228.5
percent, increase
from
$17 million
COMMENTARY:
Arnold should terminate this predator
https://kaiserpapers.com/californianews/terminate.html
Kaiser
Contract
Silence is Broken regarding ending of affiliation with Modesto
Memorialfor 88,000
Kaiser
subscribers
Senior's
death
troubles family
Kaiser
Admits Tobacco Bonds, Says It's Unloading Them
- Chronicle
Staff Report
Thursday,
June 26, 1997
Kaiser
Permanente, which has been urging all its HMO members to give
up smoking,
had a little explaining to do yesterday.
A
consumer group
disclosed that Kaiser's corporate
investment portfolio
included a $5
million stake in cigarette maker Philip Morris Cos.
Consumers
for
Quality Care, based in Los Angeles,
charged Kaiser with
hypocrisy for
running high-profile anti-smoking campaigns while at the
same time quietly loading up
on tobacco investments.
Kaiser
spokeswoman Beverly Hayon
confirmed that
Kaiser held $5 million
in Philip Morris
bonds as of Dec. 31, 1996.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/1997/06/26/MN54171.DTL
PATIENTS
AND
EMPLOYEES THAT GOT A TAD BIT UPSET WITH
KAISER STORIES
Eugene
Guevara - Why did he shoot a physician on the day he was discharged
from
Kaiser hospital?
September 21, 2003
The
media was very brave and did the right thing in presenting this
story, but now that Mr.Guevara, who
apparently
was denied appropriate medical care while a Kaiser patient,
has died, the story is fading away.
People
have been saving copies of this story and would like an update
on it. To Kaiser - this story is not going
to go
away.
https://kaiserpapers.com/californianews/eugeneg.html
NOTE
regarding the Guevara Case: Mr. Guevara first lost his wife
to
Kaiser late diagnosis and difficulty
with treatment
issues, then he
developed and illness, finally when it was too late to save him was
diagnosed with prostate cancer. Mr. Guevara had been
in the
hospital as a patient when the doctor just dismissed him and
sent him
home while letting him know that was all they were going to do for him.
Mr. Guevara's conduct of violence was
inappropriate and
certainly should never be condoned. Kaiser's
physician
didn't
have to be cold and callous to pour salt in the wound.
Mr.
Guevara was simply pushed too far and he reacted inappropriately.
September
21, 2003
Man Suspected of
Shooting M.D. Kills Self
September
21, 2003 10:54 PM
EDT
LOS ANGELES
- A man suspected of
shooting and wounding a doctor at a
hospital in a Los Angeles suburb
killed
himself Sunday outside a
fast food restaurant, police said.
Investigators
had been looking
for Eugene Guevara, 73, in connection
with Friday's shooting of a doctor at Kaiser
Permanente
Medical Center,
police said. Guevara was once a patient
there.
Dr.
Reynaldo Hernandez, who works in the hospital's
urology department, was
in stable condition at the
hospital Sunday after being shot
three
times, said Kaiser Permanente spokeswoman Reyna del Haro.
https://kaiserpapers.com/californianews/guevara.html
September
23,
2003
Baldwin
Park, Calif., Hospital Seeks Normalcy after Doctor Is Shot
Police say two family members, a neighbor and
the
victim, told
them
Guevara was unhappy with his
medical treatment.
Guevara
was being treated for diabetes by Hernandez when it was learned he
had prostate cancer.
https://kaiserpapers.com/californianews/guevara2.html
Officer
involved
shooting at Kaiser Permanente - Los Angeles
Man
kills self inside Kaiser building
Former
co-workers say he was upset over losing job
Jim Herron
Zamora, Meredith May, Chronicle Staff Writers
Friday,
November 22, 2002
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2002/11/22/BA190340.DTL
May 1975 - Two Nurses
shot in Kaiser West Los Angeles Hospital by Disgruntled Employee
https://kaiserpapers.com/californianews/May-1-1975.html
TALES OF
CORRUPTION
Sheriff
denies charges
County's top cop says coverup
claim
false by
Brian Hamlin/Senior Staff
Writer The Reporter.com
Article Launched March 3, 2007
Responding
to a recent federal lawsuit charging that the Solano County
Sheriff-Coroner's Office intentionally has covered up
medical errors
causing the death of a patient, Sheriff Gary Stanton on Friday denied
the charges as "absolutely false."
Stanton,
and
Contra Costa
County Sheriff-Coroner Warren E. Rupf, on
Monday
were named in a federal
civil rights suit
charging that they
misused their coroner positions to assist hospitals - specifically
Kaiser Permanente medical centers - in covering up treatment
errors
that resulted in death. - Read More at:
http://www.thereporter.com/news/ci_5350122
mirrored
for historical purposes at: https://kaiserpapers.com/contracostacoroner.html
MAYBE
THE FOLLOWING WILL IT MAKE
IT VERY CLEAR WHAT KAISER HAS BEEN UP
TO?
Wake Up and
Smell
the Fraud By
Salvatore, D'Anna, Spring Valley
mirrored
for historical purposes from: http://www.voiceofsandiego.org/articles/2007/02/20/letters/337fraud.txt
Tuesday,
Feb. 20, 2007 |
What is it going to take for this city to wake up and smell the fraud?
Maybe
this will help:
In
2002
J. Neal Purcell retired as Vice
Chairman, National Audit
Practice, KPMG, Intl. In 2003 Purcell
joined Kaiser
Foundation Health
Plan's Board of Directors. He was appointed Chair of Kaiser Foundation
Health Plan's Audit and Compliance Committee in 2004. His
duties
include supervision of Kaiser Foundation Health Plan's
independent
auditor, KPMG, whose contract with Kaiser Foundation Health
Plan was
awarded in 2003.
Kaiser
Foundation Health Plan retained KPMG to be its independent auditor as a
direct consequence of its decision in 2003
to voluntarily
comply with
the Sarbanes-Oxley Act.
On
October 28, 2003 Purcell, Halvorson
and other individuals implemented the illegal agreement
through illegal
and unethical acts,
including but not limited to bid rigging, in order
to enable KFHP to retain KPMG as KFHP's Sarbanes-Oxley
Act
independent auditor
to perpetrate racketeering enterprise predicate acts.
Read
the documentation here http://www.hmohardball.com/sox.html
Wake
Up and Smell the Fraud
mirrored
here for historical purposes from:http://www.voiceofsandiego.org/articles/2007/02/20/
letters/337fraud.txt
By
Salvatore, D'Anna,
Spring Valley
Tuesday,
Feb. 20, 2007 |
What is it going to take for this city to wake up and smell the
fraud?
Maybe
this will help:
In 2002 J.
Neal Purcell
retired as Vice Chairman,
National Audit
Practice, KPMG, Intl. In 2003 Purcell joined Kaiser
Foundation Health
Plan's Board of Directors. He was appointed Chair of Kaiser Foundation
Health Plan's Audit
and Compliance
Committee in 2004. His duties
include supervision of Kaiser Foundation Health Plan's independent
auditor, KPMG, whose contract with Kaiser Foundation Health Plan
was
awarded in 2003.
Kaiser
Foundation Health Plan retained KPMG to be its independent auditor as a
direct consequence of its decision in
2003
to voluntarily comply with
the Sarbanes-Oxley Act.
On October
28, 2003 Purcell,
Halvorson
and other individuals implemented the illegal agreement through
illegal and
unethical acts, including
but
not limited to bid rigging, in order
to enable KFHP to retain KPMG as KFHP's Sarbanes-Oxley
Act independent
auditor to perpetrate racketeering enterprise predicate acts.
Read the
documentation here.http://www.hmohardball.com/sox.html
Often
insurance companies in an effort
to save face and pretend
that they are perfectly
run will
ignore and or deny their errors in
judgement
and action. Rather than apologize
and say they
have made a
mistake
they will knowingly follow through to the end even
though it is
bringing
serious harm to a person and their family. This is a
immature,
outdated
business practice. Kaiser made a mistake and instead of
correcting
their
mistake when
it was discovered they chose to instead allow an
innocent
man to be
branded and
incarcerated for the sole purpose of avoiding the
publication of negative
publicity.
The following story is a
prime
example of that type of outdated business practice.
January
20,
2006 State Pays Wrongly Convicted
Man
*
Compensation board
awards Kenneth M. Marsh
$756,900. He served 21 years for
a toddler's death that was later
deemed
accidental. By Maura Dolan, Times Staff Writer
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-innocent20jan20,0,6526039.story?track=tottext,0,5684488.story?track=tothtml
Mirrored
at for
historical purposes: https://kaiserpapers.com/kenmarsh.html
Other
relevant link:http://freekenmarsh.com/index.html
Larry
King Transcript:https://kaiserpapers.com/kingmorse.html
Ellen
Stein helped OK Kaiser requests while her husband was
selling
sports
tickets
to the HMO.
Ellen
Stein,
the vice president of the Los Angeles Board of Public
Works and wife of
former
Airport Commission President Ted Stein, voted
at least four times on matters
involving
Kaiser Permanente during the
years
her family profited from the sale of $250,000
worth
of sports tickets
to
the HMO, records show.
Los
Angeles City Hall Insider Quits Post, Kaiser Job - January 14, 2004
An
influential
appointee of
Los Angeles Mayor James K.
Hahn quit both his public post and his private
job as Kaiser
Permanente's
director of government relations
Tuesday after Kaiser officials said an
investigation showed he
had
misused the
HMO's funds for political purposes.
States
unfair competition law under fire
"Kaiser says
the advertising case wasn't what it had in mind when it
wrote a
campaign check. What really annoys the HMO is a case claiming
that
it broke
the law by splitting pills and giving them to patients. Kaiser
says patients still
got the prescribed dosages, consumer groups
endorsed
the practice and plaintiffs
acknowledged that nobody got hurt."
"We have
spent over $1 million
in enrollee premiums
defending
this," said Michael Hawkins, a company attorney. "We do not think
it is
appropriate."
Side
note to this
article - According to the
Kaiser Tax form 990 - Kaiser has set
aside every year a very large
amount
of money to defend their numerous lawsuits.
So the actual
truth is
that Kaiser has a special account set aside with patient
premium money
already and the above statement as per their own tax records
is not a
truthful
one.
FRAUD
AND ABUSE IN THE HEALTH CARE MARKET OF CALIFORNIA
KAISER
PHARMACIST/PHARMACEUTICAL STORIES
From: http://kcbs.com/pages/40527.php
Kaiser
Pharmacists
Deliver Strike Notice
SAN
FRANCISCO, Calif. (KCBS)
-- Some 1,200 Kaiser Permanente pharmacists
have
threatened to walk off
the job, calling on Kaiser to improve staffing levels at
its 60
northern California pharmacies.
The
Guild for
Professional Pharmacists set a strike deadline of June 5, delivering
a
10-day
strike notice on Friday.
During
recent contract
negotiations, the Guild has asked Kaiser to
fill 250 positions
currently
vacant, about 20 percent of the pharmacist
positions in Kaiser’s northern
California
facilities, said
vice-president of the union, Howard Hertz.
“This
shortage
has lead to essentially unlimited overtime at every
Kaiser pharmacy,”
Hertz said.
“Working conditions and patient safety
are threatened by this continuing
shortage of
pharmacists.” - MORE
Mirrored
At:
https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/pharmacist/striking.html
Kaiser
Pharmacist jailed for stealing Viagra
-Author:
ROD
LEVEQUE,
Staff Writer
Date:
May 9, 2003
Publication:
Sun, The
(San Bernardino, CA)
FONTANA - A
former
Kaiser Permanente Medical Center pharmacist was
sentenced
Friday to 16
months in state prison for stealing as much as
$480,000
in Viagra from
the
hospital.
Hoi-Chi
Cheung, who admitted he stole the drug and sold it under the
table to support
his
gambling habit, was handcuffed and taken into
custody
immediately after Judge
Barry
Plotkin handed down the sentence in
Fontana
Superior Court.
"What
he
opted to do in
the end was gamble with Kaiser's money,'
Statement
from Kaiser Permanente Northern California
Regarding
Pharmacy Computer
Problem
March
17, 2003--On
Thursday, March 13,
Kaiser
Permanente
Northern California's pharmacy computer system
experienced
a power
outage that may
have resulted in labeling errors on some of
the
medications
dispensed that day. Almost all of the 4,700 patients issued
prescriptions
that day have been
reached through extensive efforts
over the
past few
days.
PHYSICIAN
FINANCIAL INCENTIVE STORIES
Interest-free
home loans are among benefits some in the
San Francisco area are
setting
up to attract physicians.
Kaiser
Permanente is providing interest-free loans of up to $100,000,
provided
a recipient
works there
for 10 years.
A
portion is forgiven for
doctors who stay on for at least five years.
For those
who leave
before then, the principal and accumulated
interest is due immediately.
Kaiser
to reveal incentives for physicians
Clerks
in three
of Kaiser's
Northern California call
centers could earn a bonus of
up
to 10% of their salary for meeting the
guidelines, which included making
appointments
for 35% or fewer of the
callers and transferring fewer than 50%
of
calls during the day
— and 60%
at night — to trained advice nurses.
Kaiser
cut its
medical budget
while adding members, tied
a portion of doctors'
pay
to how well they limited certain medical
services
and developed treatment
guidelines
based partly on advice from
cost-conscious
consultants.
Kaiser
Interest Free Loans are just one way physicians end
up
in comprising
situations
Kaiser
Permanente offers interest free loans to its doctors
PATIENT
OPINION POLLS STORIES
Patients
Criticize Kaiser the Most according to State Survey
Patients
criticize Kaiser the most Statewide survey rates
experiences
of
35,000
Kaiser
given low
marks for medical care
Kaiser
Receives Poor Diagnosis From Patients
KAISER
SHAM PEER REVIEW STORIES
***Kaiser Is Found Liable in Retaliation Case
By
Charles Ornstein, Times Staff Writer June 3, 2006
A Los
Angeles County jury found Friday that Kaiser Permanente
retaliated against
one of its emergency room physicians after he raised
concerns about the quality
of care at Kaiser's Bellflower Medical
Center.
For
historical purposes mirrored at:
https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/dirtyhospital.html
At:
http://www.latimes.com/features/health/medicine/la-me-kaiser3jun03,1,6263019.story?coll=la-health-medicine&ctrack=1&cset=true
Mirrored for
historical purposes at: https://kaiserpapers.com/woodsvskaiser.html
A Los
Angeles County jury found Friday that Kaiser Permanente
retaliated against one
of its emergency room physicians after he raised
concerns about the quality of care at
Kaiser's Bellflower Medical
Center.
[Friday's
courtroom verdict was unusual,
because Kaiser and its affiliated Permanente
physicians group generally
try to force lawsuits into binding arbitration, which is not open
to
the public. The judge in Woods' case, however, ruled that the
arbitration agreement was
unconscionable" and unenforceable.
The
arbitration provision has since been changed.
The case
publicly
spotlighted the problems at the Bellflower hospital. In one e-mail from
May 2003, Woods wrote that a patient found a urinal
containing someone
else's urine on
a nightstand in his treatment room.
In
other
e-mails, Woods detailed bloody instruments left in the sink of a
treatment room
and a shortage of nitroglycerin, epinephrine,
resuscitation bags and other supplies.]
Click on
above links for full story.
Doctor
slandered and fired for blowing whistle on
Kaiser Permanente insurance
fraud
ALL
OTHERS
10/28/07
- Kaiser Permanente on Lockdown, Reason Still Under
Investigation
http://www.fox6.com/news/local/story.aspx?content_id=48cc7802-8b77-4d2d-a891-59288e50fafc&rss=tick
Kaiser
Permanente Medical Center in Baldwin Park is
under
lockdown, officials said
today.
Reyna
Delharo, a spokeswoman for
the hospital, said police were in the
medical
center and that a
patient was being investigated, but it's not clear
why. A
Baldwin Park police
dispatcher said the hospital was under lockdown, but
would not
say why. ABC7 reported
that the lockdown was related to a possible
gang
shooting, but Delharo said
there had been no shooting inside the hospital.
mirrored at:
https://kaiserpapers.com/californianews/lockdownatbaldwinpark.html
Gunman
Threatens Patient at
Kaiser
Permanente Hospital
Police
Search Facility
10/28/07 - BALDWIN PARK, Oct. 28, 2007 (CNS)
- An anonymous caller threatened to
attack someone
inside Kaiser
Permanente Medical Center in Baldwin Park Sunday,
prompting
police to
guard the hospital and monitor patients and staff.
http://abclocal.go.com/kabc/story?section=local&id=5730966
mirrored
at: https://kaiserpapers.com/californianews/lockdownatbaldwinpark.html
10/28/07
- Threat
made to hospital leads to police lockdown
By
Brian Day, Correspondent
BALDWIN
PARK - Police surrounded
and apparently locked down Kaiser
Permanente
Medical Center late Sunday after receiving
threats of
violence, officials said.
http://www.sgvtribune.com/news/ci_7308883
mirrored at:
https://kaiserpapers.com/californianews/lockdownatbaldwinpark.html
Kaiser
Santa
Teresa flesh eating bacteria patient story
Sunday,
December 5, 2004 Kaiser caught up in fake purse scam
Deputies
seize counterfeit designer goods from Park Avenue medical
office
By
IAN
MORRISON/Staff Writer
Santa
Rosa Activist has questionable death at Kaiser
The
real story on why Kaiser Permanente is building
all
these new hospitals
in California and it has little to
do
with earthquake safety.
"
The project was to build 21 Kaiser Hospitals over the next decade"
"Kaiser had
completed an analysis that indicated they were losing
approximately
$8 million
per month per hospital as a result of sending clients to
non-Kaiser
hospitals."
More
HMO Stuff
Capitalist
Crisis in Healthcare
Kaiser
'Same
Day' Service Proves Both Late and Lengthy
Last
week I got
a "same-day"
appointment at Kaiser.
A
"same-day" appointment is
for members who have something
wrong with them,
can't wait the two or three weeks
it may
take to get an
appointment with their
regular
doctor, but are not sick enough to go to the emergency room.
Unfortunately "same-day"
appointments aren't always same
day. I called on Friday
at noon; I got an appointment for
8:30 a.m.
on Monday.
David
Lawrence, Kaiser CEO claims he is quitting
Kaiser
Permanente
Baldwin Park nurse license suspended
by
Judge
KAISER
TURNING TO COUNTY'S SMALL HOSPITALS FOR HELP ;
ANTICIPATING
SURGE OF
NEW
MEMBERS, HMO MAY CONTRACT OUT SERVICES -
BLEYS
W. ROSE THE PRESS DEMOCRAT
Vaccine
Testing
on Kids Blocked U.S. turns down a Harbor-
UCLA
smallpox
proposal for 2- to
5-year-olds.
By Charles Ornstein
Times
Staff Writer
Not
Buying Kaiser's
Line - This is regarding the breakdown of
negotiations
between
Kaiser and
Modesto Memorial
Hospital
Kaiser
Vallejo
Sars Breakout? by Carl F. Worden -
Sierra
Times.com
Kaiser
ER
Nurse
arrested in probe of thefts by Andrea Cavanaugh
California’s
Ailing System of Caring for Children with Special
Health Care Needs
https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/childlrenspecial.html
KAISER AD
CAMPAIGN
STORIES - See also - http://kaiserthrive.org
State
looks at whether HMO misled Coachella Valley members about a switch to
its doctors.
By
Charles Ornstein, Times Staff Writer
June 1, 2006
State
regulators are
investigating Kaiser Permanente's Southern
California operation
for allegedly deceptive marketing practices
related to the upcoming transfer of about
18,000 Coachella Valley
patients from outside doctors to the HMO's staff physicians.
The
California Department of Managed Health Care is looking into whether
Kaiser
misled members into believing that they could continue seeing
their current primary
care doctors when, in fact, that will no longer
be the case after June 30.
"We
are investigating the situation for a potential violation of the
Health and
Safety Code," managed care agency spokeswoman Lynne Randolph
said...... MORE
JON
CARROLL -- Getaway Day At
the Ionic Column
JON CARROLL
Friday,
December 1, 1995
Folks, you
have a problem. I'd
suggest that maybe you scrap the
feel-good,
twinkly-obstetrician ``Hi, Jonah'' big-bucks ad campaign designed to
lure
more
patients into the Kaiser system, and maybe concentrate on
communicating
better
with the people you have.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/1995/12/01/DD72299.DTL
An
Outbreak
of HMO Ads
Though
pleasant, they're
useless if you're looking for real information
- Carl T.
Hall, Chronicle Staff
Writer
Monday,
October 23, 1995
Flowers,
joggers,
kids, talking dogs, acrobatic
senior citizens and
not a
sick person in sight.
Welcome
to the
world of health care as viewed
through the lens of advertising.
It's
a softly lit, warm and
friendly
world.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/1995/10/23/BU17473.DTL
Kaiser
sued for
not covering Viagra
By TERRI
VERMEULEN
The lawsuit,
filed this
week on behalf of 77-year-old Louis Marcil
in Los Angeles
Superior Court, alleges that Kaiser Permanente engaged
in
fraudulent and unfair
business practices, false advertising and
intentionally
misled consumers by
denying benefits for Viagra.
KAISER TRYING TO CONVINCE
EVERYONE THAT
THEY NEED TO PROVIDE NATIONAL HEALTH CARE STORIES
NOTE:
What Kaiser does
not mention in
this article is that they
don't allow what
they are proposing themselves without a court or
government
agency forcing them to.
Kaiser calls
in the feds
-
EXAMINER EDITORIAL WRITER
Sunday,
September 28, 1997
What Kaiser
proposes - along with Group Health Cooperative of Puget
Sound
(a Washington-based group recently acquired by Kaiser) and New
York-based
HIP
Health Insurance Plans - represents a healthy start toward
protecting
140 million
Americans enrolled in managed care plans. Among the
national
standards suggested
by the three HMOs:
Kaiser
and
other Transplant
Issues
kaiserpapers > californianews
> transplant
KAISER STRIKING EMPLOYEE STORIES
From: http://kcbs.com/pages/40527.php
Kaiser
Pharmacists Deliver
Strike Notice
SAN
FRANCISCO, Calif. (KCBS)
-- Some 1,200 Kaiser Permanente pharmacists have threatened
to
walk off
the job, calling on Kaiser to improve staffing levels at its
60
northern California pharmacies.
The
Guild for
Professional Pharmacists set a strike deadline of June 5, delivering a
10-day strike
notice on Friday.
During
recent
contract negotiations, the Guild has asked Kaiser to
fill 250 positions currently vacant,
about 20
percent
of
the pharmacist
positions in Kaiser’s northern California facilities, said
vice-president of the union,
Howard Hertz.
“This
shortage has
lead to essentially unlimited overtime at every
Kaiser pharmacy,” Hertz said.
“Working
conditions
and
patient safety
are threatened by this continuing shortage of pharmacists.” -
MORE
Mirrored
At: https://kaiserpapers.com/news/ca/pharmacist/striking.html
Equipment
malfunctions that harmed patients
CONTAMINATED
AIR
PUMPED INTO KAISER'S BABY INCUBATORS
SACRAMENTO
BEE
November 30, 1984
Author: Ted Bell
Compressed
air
contaminated by
oil fumes was accidentally pumped into baby incubators,
the
neonatal
intensive care unit and the
adjacent hallways in Sacramento's Kaiser
Hospital
for several hours in September, a hospital official
acknowledged Thursday.
Kaiser
spokeswoman Susan Pieper said that none of the nine infants being
treated in the
unit was harmed by the accident.
But 52
hospital
employees, almost all of them nurses, have signed a petition demanding
the
facts behind the accident and what hospital
administrators plan to
do about it.
https://kaiserpapers.com/contaminatedair.html
SACRAMENTO
BEE -
December 1, 1984
LAWYER
TO PROBE KAISER 'AIR' INCIDENT
The
parents of an ailing baby boy born in Kaiser Hospital's neonatal
intensive care unit in
September hired a Sacramento lawyer
Friday
to
investigate whether an air compressor malfunction
in the
unit may have
caused the child's recurring respiratory problems.
Lawyer
Allan Owen
said the parents, whom he would not identify, believe hospital
officials gave
them an incomplete account of what happened
in the+ unit
late Sept. 12, when several nurses
noticed a strange odor
and... SACRAMENTO
BEE -
December 11, 1984 THREE
NURSES TREATED AFTER FOUL AIR PUMPED INTO KAISER NEONATAL UNIT
SECOND
INCIDENT A second incident in which
foul-smelling air was pumped into Kaiser
Hospital's neonatal intensive
care unit sent three nurses to
the
emergency room for treatment. But two infants in the unit were
left
hooked to the compressed air system that carried the foul
smell because
the hospital didn't have
enough backup equipment to supply
the babies
with clean air, The Bee has learned.
The
second incident
occurred on the
overnight shift of Sept. 14-15, just two days after air...
SACRAMENTO
BEE -
December 28, 1984 NURSE
SUING FOR $25 MILLION OVER KAISER
FOUL AIR INCIDENT
A
Sacramento
nurse filed a $25 million lawsuit Thursday, charging that
Kaiser Hospital officials failed
to tell her and other nurses
that
compressors used to pump air into infants' intensive care units were
faulty.
Gail Kleve, who specializes in neonatal intensive
care, filed
the suit against Kaiser Foundation Hospitals.
Kleve has said
she became
ill during the evening of Sept. 12-13 when nurses discovered
a foul
smell coming
from the system that mixes compressed air with
oxygen
and...
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