Illinois urged to investigate doctors with tainted records

2-12-2012 Illinois:

State ranks 20th in rate of serious disciplinary actions against physicians

Six years ago, Oklahoma took away the medical license of a physician over sexual misconduct. A managed care organization in that state took emergency action to suspend the doctor's clinical privileges, and New York also revoked the doctor's license to practice there.

Four years ago, the doctor was kicked out of Medicare and other federal health programs for a felony conviction having to do with controlled substances. The physician, who at some point has held a license to practice in Illinois, has settled at least a half-dozen malpractice cases. One involved brain damage in a patient who was left a quadriplegic. The doctor also has been sued over allegations of sexual misconduct and dispensing the wrong medication.

All of this information would be available to Illinois regulators if they looked for it. The National Practitioner Data Bank, established by federal law, collects it to help identify "problem doctors" and prevent them from moving from state to state.

But unlike officials in many states, the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation does not regularly query the databank for information about actions taken against the state's physicians.

As of September, there is no record in the databank of the IDFPR's taking any disciplinary action against this doctor, whose identity is cloaked from public view but available to medical board officials.

According to the databank, about 215 doctors who have been licensed in Illinois had their clinical privileges revoked or restricted by their hospitals or managed care organizations over a roughly 20-year period, with no apparent action taken by Illinois' licensing authority. The organizations deemed some of them to be an immediate threat to the health or safety of patients.

"It is rare for hospitals and managed care organizations to take any actions against doctors," said Dr. Sidney Wolfe of the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen, which has been pushing state medical boards to discipline substandard doctors. "And when they do, the actions are usually very serious, which makes it even more inexcusable that the state medical board, in the face of what are very serious actions, has not done anything at all."

Sue Hofer, spokeswoman for IDFPR, said the agency cannot afford to regularly query the databank because of the expense, $4.75 per doctor report. Some states charge higher licensing fees and can better afford it, she said.

She also said information in the databank is not always reliable. "When we have dealt with the National Practitioner Data Bank, we have consistently found discrepancies between our records of licensing and discipline and what appears on their readouts," Hofer said.

But nearly a year after the Tribune first reported on the issues raised by Public Citizen, Hofer said recently that agency staff will check the databank to find out if the doctors cited by the group are still licensed in Illinois, then seek records from the Federation of State Medical Boards to see if disciplinary action should be taken.

"But we will not be in a position to determine whether disciplinary action is necessary or appropriate for months at the soonest," she said. "We're not able to make a judgment without giving that doctor due process and reviewing the case."

In a letter to Public Citizen last month, the chief medical coordinator for IDFPR, Dr. Brian S. Zachariah, listed some possible reasons that no disciplinary action was noted for the 215 doctors. ..Source.. by Deborah L. Shelton, Chicago Tribune reporter