Nearly 500 Mass. doctors disciplined in a decade
By Martin Finucanea, Associated Press, 06/30/00
BOSTON -- Twenty-five doctors in Massachusetts were hit with 10 or more malpractice payments or state disciplinary actions during the 1990s, according to a federal database that has collected data on doctors in trouble nationwide.
Two of the worst cases: Fourteen malpractice payments were made for one doctor, totaling $1.4 million, and that doctor was disciplined six times. The doctor's license was revoked in 1992. Another doctor had 20 malpractice payments totaling about $1.5 million and five disciplinary actions.
A total of 488 disciplinary actions were taken by the state Board of Registration in Medicine through the 1990s. And a total of 2,384 malpractice payouts were made during that time.
The Massachusetts data is contained in the National Practitioner Data Bank, which the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has been compiling since 1990. The government provides a version of the database, created by a 1986 federal law, to the public.
But the names of doctors and other identifying information are not released.
Some consumer advocates and Congressional lawmakers are pressing for disclosure of the names. Most doctors oppose such a release, arguing that the data is skewed by malpractice insurance settlements, which are made before the truth of a case is determined in court.
For Massachusetts, the database also indicated that there were 149 cases in which hospitals took disciplinary actions against doctors.
There were 24,231 doctors in the state according to 1996 figures from the American Medical Association. The numbers average out to about 2 disciplinary actions per year for every 1,000 doctors, or about 10 malpractice payments per 1,000 doctors per year.
Some activists believe the state Board of Registration in Medicine hasn't been tough enough in disciplining doctors.
Dr. Sidney Wolfe, director of Public Citizen's Health Research Group in Washington, said: "People in Massachusetts are not being adequately protected from doctors who may well be ... killing patients."
Wolfe said his group had done its own analysis, using data compiled by state disciplinary agencies, and in the past decade Massachusetts has ranked toward the bottom of the states in the rate of serious disciplinary actions against doctors.
"It is dangerously uneven from state to state as to how much protection the board gives to the public," he said. "The boards are supposed to protect the public, not keep doctors who shouldn't be practicing in practice."
He did commend Massachusetts, however, for including malpractice data and hospital disciplinary data along with the board discipline data on the Board of Registration in Medicine's Physician Profile Web site.
On that site, citizens can look up specific doctors by name and see if they have any black marks against their records. But they can't sort the files to find who are the most-disciplined doctors.
Pamela Wood, general counsel for the board, didn't immediately have a comment on Friday.
--- On the Net:
National Practitioner Data Bank: http://www.npdb-hipdb.com/
Massachusetts Physician Profiles: http://www.docboard.org
