Gosh, I LOVE Lawyers...

[jsl]

Profit motive is a hard argument to make in this case. Now, if your story is true, then I am not going to defend the physicians at all. It seems, from the facts you provided to be a clear cut failure to diagnose. And I am sorry for your loss.

That said, I do not think you can argue profit motive. Cardiothorasic surgery and invasive cardiology remain two of the highest reimbursed areas in medicine, both from Medicaid/Medicare and, through the "magic" of DRGs, private insurance. To bring in a patient for cardiac treatment is generally big bucks for a hospital. CHF, on the other hand, always loses money. I do suspect, however, given your dad's age, that treatment for the underlying cause of the failure (i.e., cardiac ischemia) would be more likely than symptomatic treatment. Now again, I am not defending the physicians involved, I am just questioning your contention that "profit motive" was behind the error.

- H

Roughly 7,000 narcotics (darvisette sp?, vicatin) and Valium to offset jitters from inhalers. Ungodly numbers of pills. These were from the same provider in a less than three year period. I would argue this is setting up a repeat customer, hence profit. This is a true story, and I didn't even know he took this much medicine until after the fact. The dr. in question moved to Michigan (from NC) and had other law suits pending. We never pursued action, by the way. I wouldn't have felt sorry for his career had we. I worked in IT to answer the other post, All information filtered through my department. Diagnosing heart failure and interpreting HL7 interfaces are worlds apart, thus I was ignorant. I'll agree no one is perfect, but you have to draw lines somewhere.

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[FoughtFyr]

hmm given what you say, it looks much more like a profit motive and if that is the case then obviously the doctor is at fault. if CHF losses money every time, then it is probablly an underdiagnosed problem because they dont want to deal with it. if that is the case then it is a sad thing.....

No, not really. The CHF that loses money is the untreatable geriatric population. This is because of a CMS rule that prohibits payment for a CHF related hospital stay if there was a previous CHF related hospital stay within the previous 30 days. In other words, a mandated 30 day "gaurantee" on CHF. As many older folks "bounce back" frequently, they end up staying for free by federal rules. Given the poster's father was 53, it is unlikely they would have been so passive with CHF. More liklely, he would (had the condition been recognized) been cathed or CABG'd. Those procedures pay well. Instead, according to the poster, the condition was treated as fibromyalgia (not a money maker) or MS injury (also not a money maker - except for chiropractors). All I am saying is that it is unlikely the physicians involved were motivated by profit. If they were, he (the poster's father) would have been off to the cath lab in a heartbeat (pardon the pun!).

- H

 

[FoughtFyr]

Roughly 7,000 narcotics (darvisette sp?, vicatin) and Valium to offset jitters from inhalers. Ungodly numbers of pills. These were from the same provider in a less than three year period. I would argue this is setting up a repeat customer, hence profit. This is a true story, and I didn't even know he took this much medicine until after the fact. The dr. in question moved to Michigan (from NC) and had other law suits pending. We never pursued action, by the way. I wouldn't have felt sorry for his career had we. I worked in IT to answer the other post, All information filtered through my department. Diagnosing heart failure and interpreting HL7 interfaces are worlds apart, thus I was ignorant. I'll agree no one is perfect, but you have to draw lines somewhere.

No question that some doctors have run "narcotics mills" and do so strictly for profit. But that is not medicine, it is drug dealing and fraud; and is generally treated as such by the authorities. I won't even grant the grace of calling such a person a "physician" as that infers a level of care for the patient not evident in these folks. I am sorry your father got mixed up with such a person, but please understand a crook is a crook regardless of the degree thaey have obtained. This is hardly representative of medicine in general. I don't think anyone here would defend these folks at all.

I stand by the fact that the hospital (that you impuned in your post) was not likely motivated by profit. If they were, there were more lucarative (and in this case, more theraputic) treatments available.

- H