[kaiserthrive.org editor’s note: Hallelujah, regulators have finally seen the light! Too bad Kaiser will respond with another useless ‘plan of correction’, with no real intentions of actually following through with it.]
From San Francisco Business Times:
DMHC probe of Kaiser delayed, fines expected
by Chris Rauber
An investigation of Kaiser Permanente by the state Department of Managed Health Care, originally expected to conclude last October but later expanded, is taking far longer than expected to complete.
The department oversees HMOs and other managed-care plans. At stake is whether Kaiser is in compliance with California’s Knox-Keene Act, which regulates the state’s managed-care plans.
The probe, originally part of investigations into Kaiser’s now-defunct Northern California kidney transplant program, was later expanded to cover how the Oakland-based health-care giant handles consumer complaints and a wide spectrum of quality of care and oversight issues.
“It’s a really complicated report, and we’re working (on) some corrective actions,” DMHC spokeswoman Lynne Randolph told the San Francisco Business Times this week. In addition, Randolph said, the department would be “penalizing” Kaiser with monetary fines, but she said details aren’t clear yet.
Ultimately, however, some combination of required corrective actions and financial penalties is expected, Randolph said.
At this point, a final report is expected by mid-July, roughly eight and a half months after the original deadline. Since then, state officials have said at various times that the expanded investigation would be completed in the first quarter, by late April and by late May.
In November, state health regulators widened a probe of Kaiser’s process for handling complaints beyond its ill-fated San Francisco-based kidney transplant unit and into other operations at the health-care behemoth. The investigation grew to include Kaiser’s entire California system and a broad spectrum of quality-of-care and oversight issues, regulators said in November. It involves the Kaiser Foundation Health Plan’s responsibility for overseeing the quality of care at its medical centers and medical groups, including the Permanente Medical Group in Northern California, state officials said at the time.
Back in November, Denise Schmidt, another DMHC spokeswoman, said the investigation expanded when regulators realized problems at the troubled kidney unit may have been a small piece of a larger puzzle. “In this case, the kidney program (is being) closed down,” Schmidt said at the time, “so if they correct the way that particular program handles grievances, that’s not going to solve the problem.”
Cindy Ehnes, the department’s director, initially thought the investigation would be finished last October, but that was before its scope expanded.
Previously:
Another Kaiser “quality of care” deficiency concerns their qualification requirements for the physical therapists who are allowed to perform manual lymph drainage (MLD) as part of complete decongestive therapy CDT) for lymphedema. Physical therapists with as little as 22.5 hours of specialized lymphedema training over and above their license requirements are allowed to treat lymphedema patients. National lymphedema therapist certification requirements are a minimum of 135 hours followed by one year of professional practice under a certified therapist. The California Physical Therapy Board has stated that a therapist with inadequate training and competence providing MLD/CDT to a lymphedema patient is practicing outside of their license. [Details and Kaiser’s response to my complaint are available from this writer.]
How about this “plan of correction”? Kaiser decides that it’s corporate presence is hopelessly sick, degraded and crumbling, and in the interest of empathy for patients everywhere, it closes down all its ‘health care’ centers and thus frees up hundreds of badly needed independent doctors. 🙂
Great Idea! Let the people live!
I watched a movie called Resident Evil on the SciFi channel tonight, and this was the narrated opening:
Yikes! Sound like anyone we know?
It sure does.
Michael Moore addressing the California state legislature on his new movie ‘Sicko’:
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/
We have the transcripts from that conversation between Nixon and Ehrlichman on the About Kaiser page.
So, when the DMHC releases this report next month, who is coming with me to see it unveiled. I think that there should be a large public presense and an aggressive media response at corporate HQ and the various local entities. Does anyone care to comment upon the effect that this will have on folks who were bambuzzled and thought that justice would be denied. There is no statute of limitations when fraud was involved so where will this lead ultimately.
“There is no statute of limitations when fraud was involved so where will this lead ultimately.”
If this truly is the case then there would not be ANY statute of limitations in Kaiser cases EVER since losing/witholding/destroying records IS fraud.
I was under the impression that if fraud was involved then mandatory binding arbitration no longer applied.
I would love to be there to see the report unveiled.
Kaiser Riverside Medical Facility, Audiologistcompleted an evaluation on 5/14/2010. I exploaned that I am a Veteran and have processed medical evaluations with the Veterans Administration. After the evaluation was completed, I requested a print out. In the impression section, he wrote, “Malinguerin”. meaning to seek monetart compensation. I was upset of the false allegation and implecation. After further thought, I will ask Kaiser to remove me from medical membership after over 35 years. There is still racial medical profiling and this was observed by the not mentioned Audiologist at Riverside Kaiser MC.