Thousands of doctors are currently practicing medicine while being on probation for issues ranging from sexual misconduct and drug addiction to unprofessional and dangerous treatment of patients. But it’s difficult and time-consuming for consumers to find out if their doctor is one of them, according to Consumer Reports.
A survey by Consumer Reports finds that 82 percent of Americans are in favor of requiring doctors to tell their patients if they’re on probation and why. And, 66 percent lean toward barring doctors from seeing patients until their probationary period ends. However, state medical boards and the American Medical Association have opposed efforts to create greater transparency around physicians’ disciplinary actions.
“The onus shouldn’t be on patients to investigate their physicians,” said Lisa McGiffert, director of Consumer Reports’ Safe Patient Project. “Doctors on probation should be required to tell their patients about their status, and explain the reasons behind it.”
The report describes cases such as the one of an obstetrician-gynecologist in Southern California. The doctor continues to practice despite a report from the state medical board alleging that his errors of medical knowledge, judgment, protocol, and attentiveness contributed to the death of two young mothers who had recently given birth to healthy babies.
The Consumer Reports’ investigation found that people looking for a new doctor online would have a difficult time figuring out whether their doctor was being disciplined.
The organization is recommending policy reforms that would make the system more transparent, including requiring doctors to tell patients when and why they are on probation, providing information from state medical board records in a clear and consistent way, and making information from the National Practitioner Data Bank open to the public. The NPDB collects information on physicians’ malpractice payouts and disciplinary records.
“You can find out more about the safety record of your toaster and whether or not it’s going to catch on fire than you can find about your physicians,” said patient-safety advocate Robert E. Oshel, the former associate director for research and disputes at the NPDB.
An analysis of NPDB data done for Consumer Reports by Oshel found that less than 2 percent of the nation’s doctors have been responsible for half of the total malpractice payouts since the government began collecting malpractice information. In total, about $85 billion has been paid out in malpractice cases during that period.
While malpractice is considered an inexact indication of substandard care, Oshel said that multiple large settlements against a doctor “can be a warning sign … suggesting that if licensing boards and hospital peer reviewers were willing to either get these doctors to stop practicing or get retraining, we’d all be better off.”
Only hospitals, doctors, law enforcement, insurance companies, and a few other groups have access to NPDB data. Consumers must rely on their state medical board, many of which have complicated websites and require time-consuming processes to get answers about specific doctors’ records.
As part of its report, Consumer Reports investigated the state medical board websites in all 50 states and rated them from best to worst. The California, New York, and Massachusetts websites were the highest, and Hawaii’s, Indiana’s, and Mississippi’s were the lowest.
For rankings of all the medical boards, go to ConsumersUnion.org/safepatientproject.
If patients suspect they has been harmed by a doctor, they should:
- Recognize a cause for action. This includes physical or sexual abuse, the doctor is under the influence of alcohol or drugs, or poor medical has been received.
- Consider contacting the police and a lawyer, the police to file criminal charges for sexual or physical abuse and a lawyer for a malpractice lawsuit.
- Contact the state board. To find your state’s board, go to org/safepatientproject.
- Gather your records. Make a paper copy of your complaint and file it with copies of your medical records and other supporting documents.
The report, “What You Don’t Know About Your Doctor Could Hurt You,” appears in the May issue of Consumer Reports and online at ConsumerReports.org. Consumer Reports magazine also is available in most libraries.
For information on how to select a doctor, see my article "How to Choose a Doctor."
