Journalist groups decry removal of online doctor discipline data

By Chelsea Conaboy, Globe Staff

The stated mission of the National Practitioners Databank is to improve health care quality and protect the public’s interest. To help state regulators, hospitals, and health care associations that monitor doctor competency, the databank collects information about malpractice suits, drug enforcement and doctor discipline into one searchable database.

A public version of the database posted online, containing no doctor names or addresses, has long been an important tool for journalists and consumer advocates. At least it was -- until the federal agency that oversees the databank pulled it from a government website earlier this month, prompting calls for a reversal.

What’s interesting is that the agency acted in response to complaints from a doctor who was the subject of a Kansas City Star investigation of physicians still in good standing with their state licensing boards despite lengthy malpractice histories. The story was told through state statistics from the databank, interviews, and court filings.

After the physician told the US Health Resources and Services Administration that reporter Alan Bavley was planning to write an article using databank information, the agency sent Bavley a letter threatening civil penalties if he disclosed confidential information.

Health Resources and Services Administration spokesman Martin Kramer said in an interview yesterday that the agency is required by law to look into potential breaches in confidentiality. The agency stopped pursuing the matter, Kramer said, when it learned that Bavley was simply using the public information on its website.

Yet, it still pulled the file offline.

Kramer said the agency staff wanted to review the file to “figure out a way to make as much information publicly available as possible, as quickly as possible, that would also maintain the confidentiality of the practitioners contained in the databank.”

Presidents of three journalism groups -- the Association of Health Care Journalists, Investigative Reporters & Editors, and the Society of Professional Journalists -- yesterday wrote to agency administrator Mary K. Wakefield, asking her to return the file to the web immediately.

“The Public Use File, while it didn’t identify doctors by name or address, provided invaluable information about the functioning of state medical boards and hospital disciplinary systems,” the letter said. “Reporters for years have used the data to identify flaws in their states’ regulatory systems that have led to patient harm. As a result of these stories, states have enacted new legislation and medical boards have taken steps to investigate problem doctors.”

Those groups have posted a databank file downloaded in August here.

Consumer group Public Citizen and the Consumers Union Safe Patient Project also have written to Wakefield.

Kramer said there’s nothing in the law that requires the agency to make a public use file available, but the law does require it to protect information that could identify doctors.

Readers, what do you think? Should the public file be restored? Would you want to see more information online? Doctors, are you concerned about the confidentiality of the database?

(Full disclosure: Globe Health and Science Editor Gideon Gil is a member of the Association for Health Care Journalists board. I am a dues-paying member.)