MALPRACTICE CASE SOON TO BE DECIDED BY SUPREME COURT

Malpractice reform in Utilization Review is again on the line, this time because the California Supreme Court has scheduled hearings re  King v. CompPartners on May 29. The case resolves about the rights of an injured worker when UR denies access to treatment ordered by a California licensed  physician and when, as a result of this medically wrong UR decision, an injured worker is not only denied treatment but also suffers harm as a result of the combined negligence of UR and the insurance carrier that benefits financially by being absolved of its obligation to pay for care.


The current issue revolves about the decision of an insurance company to stop paying for Kirk King's klonopin. The insurance company's decision was made on the basis of a utilization reviewer's wrongful judgement that could in due course prove harmful to physicians engaged in UR. Our information is that the UR doctor made an incorrect and harmful decision that was happily adopted by the insurance company. This quick-step could end up with a two-step revision of UR, namely, requiring that UR physicians be licensed in the states where their decisions are used and that they carry malpractice insurance in those states. This publication favors both steps. 

The California Workers Compensation Institute  (CWCI) has argued  that UR is not medical practice, a clearly absurd position to treating physicians and to the patients who are harmed. This fatuous argument was supported twice by Gov. Schwarzenegger and once by Gov. Brown who vetoed bills that would have implemented state licensing for UR and IMR (Independent Medical Review) doctors. Brown's reasoning was more tortured than Schwarzenegger's -- he said that requiring UR doctors to be licensed "would be an abrupt change and inconsistent with the manner in which utilization review is conducted by health care service plans under the Knox-Keene Act and by those regulated by the California Department of Insurance."

THAT is just the point: UR and IMR decisions that deny indicated and necessary care are harmful intrusions into medical care and should be squashed. These denials require the abandonment of the duty of care owed to injured workers. CWCI's reading of the law is frivolous, legalizes abandonment of sick and injured workers, and deserves to be repealed along with enabling law created by SB 863 --  which added insult to injury by adding IMR to the Utilization Review process.

In a nutshell, in the unfortunate case of Kirk King, the insurance carrier stopped payment for prescribed medication based on  the UR doctor's report. The result was that the patient suffered epileptic seizures.  

The opinion of this publication is that the injured worker was abandoned and that the UR system and the insurance company were at fault and opened the door to the malpractice litigation now in progress. The harm that befell Kirk King is proof that the UR system practiced unsound and negligent medicine. 

The Supreme Court should find that UR doctors owe a duty of care to injured workers and that in the King case UR and the insurer were negligent. Such a decision will restore equity between treatment and utilization review. 

References

High Court to Hear Arguments in UR Malpractice Dispute May 29, Workcompcentral, 2018-05-11

Malpractice by Utilization Review?, The Weinmann Report, 12/13/2014 (www.politicsofhealthcare.com)

Malpractice Reform Makes it to California Supreme Court, The Weinmann Report, 01/02/2017

CALIFORNIA'S PROPOSED DIALYSIS INITIATIVE (Proposition 8)

The California Dialysis Initiative is up for vote in November. Its avowed purpose is to set arbitrary limits on what insurance companies pay dialysis clinics for actual patient care. The initiative sounds like it might be a protective device shielding patients from being overcharged. It isn't.

The dialysis clinics will be obliged to pay physicians and other providers less if they want to maintain current levels of corporate  profit. At the same time, to keep administrative charges intact, the clinic administrations will be obliged to scramble their physicians and require them to see more patients per unit of time.  It's called "efficiency." 

The California Medical Association is opposed to the initiative  because it poses potential harm to patients, but probably also because it poses financial hardship on large clinics and healthcare plans. For instance, healthcare contracts to provide care would have to be revisited and revised downwards. Current contracts would have to be renegotiated.  Physicians, through no fault of their own, would be obliged to bear the brunt of reduced remuneration to keep the money flowing to the upper echelons of administration. That's how business is done in America, isn't it? 

Once profitability is reversed recruitment of providers will drop. The trouble is that dialysis patients aren't in-and-out customers -- they often need lengthy visits, often more than occasionally -- so in the final analysis this initiative is against their best interests. That's why this initiative needs to go back to the drawing board.  

SB 1303 (Pan and Galgiani) is a step forward

SB 1303 is follow-up legislation to SB 1189 (Pan) and expands upon the partial success of the earlier bill.This legislation, initially sponsored by the Union of American Physicians and Dentists (UAPD), is currently co-sponsored by the California Medical Association (CMA). It requires counties with 500,000 or more population to rely on physician-MDs or DOs who are Medical Examiners to do forensic autopsies. It does away with the outmoded and politically orientated Sheriff-Coroner system. All that is explained in our earlier reporting illustrating how cover ups of wrongful death could happen under the Coroner system. 

The UAPD Legislative Report, 4/28/2018, said that UAPD President Stu Bussey, MD, JD, and Bennet Omalu, MD, MBA, of movie Concussion fame, "vociferously advocated on the need for this bill" before the Senate Governance and Finance Committee. Clearly, their testimony was convincing. 

The CMA Legislative Hot List, 5/3/2018, states that the San Joaquin County Board of Supervisors recently eliminated the office of the sheriff Coroner and adopted a Medical Examiner model. CMA, with deserved self-praise, said "the pressure from this legislation clearly influenced the county's decision." 

The Weinmann Report, accepts plaudits, too. The California Society of Industrial Medicine and Surgery (CSIMS), the California Neurology Society (CNS), and others who saw the need and supported this legislation also deserve recognition. 

As we go to print, our information is that the bill is in Senate Appropriations. Physicians should write, e-mail, or fax Doug Chiappetta who is handling the bill for the UAPD and Stuart Thompson who is doing the job for the CMA to give this bill high priority. SB 1303 is a step forward in restoring professional prerogatives to properly educated professional persons.

References

Dr. Richard Pan Introduces Bill to Boost Public Confidence in Autopsy Reports, 20 Feb 2018, 
contact Shannon Velayas Martinez, 916-271-2867

The Weinmann Report, "SB 1303 would replace coroners with medical examiners," 2/25/18

The Weinmann Report, "forensic autopsy bill clears senate moves to assembly, 06/02/16

The Weinmann Report, "When is death by drowning described as 'undetermined'? " 5/30/16

The Weinmann Report, "Probable drowning," 5/23/16

CSIMS, "Issue of Interference in forensic autopsies isn't a new issue," 12/20/17