From the Los Angeles Times: Discipline meted out to Kaiser — Transplant oversight group drops ‘good standing’ rating seven months after the HMO closes kidney program in San Francisco. By Charles Ornstein and Tracy Weber, Times Staff Writers December 14, 2006 TUCSON ? Seven months after Kaiser Permanente announced that it was closing its problem-plagued… Read More »
From CBS5.com: (AP) SAN FRANCISCO — A national organ transplant association criticized Kaiser Permanente’s San Francisco Medical Center Wednesday for mismanaging its kidney transplant program. The Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network declared the medical center to be a “member not in good standing” because it “effectively denied patient access to kidney transplantation and threatened safety… Read More »
[kaiserthrive.org editor’s note: Kaiser’s statement expressing its regrets and that it “believes notifying our members of the possible breach…is the right thing to do,” almost makes you believe it is finally learning something from public criticism of its ‘deny everything’ approach to handling complaints. Almost, because notification is actually required by law. Still, we’re pleased… Read More »
From OrengonLive.com: It should be noted that Kaiser Permanente vigorously defended Dr. Death Jayant Patel in malpractice cases that were filed against him during his tenure at Kaiser. They only took action after several people had been harmed and revictimized by Kaiser lawyers in the rigged Kaiser arbitration process. Several recommendations were also made by… Read More »
From the Los Angeles Times: L.A. files patient ‘dumping’ charges — Kaiser Permanente is accused of leaving a homeless woman to wander on skid row. By Richard Winton and Cara Mia DiMassa, Times Staff Writers November 16, 2006 The Los Angeles city attorney’s office filed false-imprisonment and dependent care endangerment charges against hospital giant Kaiser… Read More »
Kaiser and Epic are going to great pains to do damage control and spread the positive PR in a new article by Wisconsin Technology Network, including planting a positive comment by a Kaiser employee who swears that HealthConnect is “beyond a doubt the best medical record” she has ever used. Unfortunately there are plenty of… Read More »
San Francisco Business Times – November 10, 2006 by Chris Rauber 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. The state Department of Managed Health Care’s investigation now covers Kaiser’s entire California system and includes… Read More »
Update 11/7/06: The full text of Justen Deal’s email to all Kaiser employees has been archived here. According to a new web site, www.fixkp.org, that was recently created by Justen Deal, a Kaiser manager: Kaiser Permanente could face losses of as much as $7 billion dollars over the next two years. These losses would be… Read More »
From the Cleburne Times-Review: Michael Mager: The history and meaning of managed health care I recently wrote a story about a woman who donated a kidney to her husband so he could get off dialysis. The woman then developed diabetes and, because it was a pre-existing condition, her health insurance denied her claim. So she… Read More »
From SignOnSandiego.com: Medical board says physician ignored man’s cancer symptoms By David Hasemyer UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER October 23, 2006 For the last two years of her husband’s life, Shirley Gaytan watched him wither away. They both knew something was wrong, yet repeated visits to his doctor failed to provide an answer to his worsening health.… Read More »