I have wanted to write this segment for awhile, and have been putting it off. I don’t really know how to approach this topic without my personal feelings coming in to the mix. But I am a person.
As a Credentialer, I didn’t make the big decisions. I brought the facts of a physician I found to others (that made more money than I) to make the hard choices. I was grateful for it. If it was the wrong choice I would feel less guilty, but amazingly enough that was never that case. I always felt there was more I should have done. If I had only done this, or maybe checked that again, the outcome would have been different. I should have felt better knowing that the blame would not rest at my feet but it never helped. I have always felt there was something more I could have done.
What if you did all you could but the information you received was a lie? Would that make it easier? Would I feel less guilty? If I had dug deeper, not trusted the verifications I’d received? Maybe if I asked three times for the truth, they would have given it to me. What about those people who told you the lie? The Physicians who wrote you “Glowing letters of Reference” for a Provider they fired because of a Drug Problem. What happened to “Do no harm” does that only apply to your direct patients? What about the Hospital; that thought I would see a GIANT RED FLAG when they replied to my Verification letter with an form letter that stated “Due to the volume of our requests”…?
I have Credentialed hundreds of Physicians, and for every two of them I received a letter that started “Due to the volume of our requests”. Am I the only one who didn’t know this was a red flag until the Kadlec case? I thought they were just being lazy. (To be fair, one person for every thousand letters is not lazy, it’s over worked) Someone actually thought this letter up, such a fast way to dispense the verification requests. The funniest thing is, if you dare send the same letter to a place that ‘SENT’ you one of these, they get huffy. “It’s against our bylaws” or “we have certain standards”
What happens when the powers that be decide to let it be someone else’s problem? They took a big gamble and everybody lost. A Doctor lost a license. A hospital and two Physicians’ reputations have been tarnished if not ruined and all of them have all been sued millions of dollars. But more importantly a woman lost her life. A family lost their mother.
It’s the court case of the century.
Before it was a court case, it was a lie! I wonder if the physicians thought ‘it’s a small lie, he’ll be fine’ or the hospital just figured they didn’t have to say anything because ‘he just doesn’t work here anymore’.
Were they hoping that one another would say something they themselves were to spineless to say? Or did they work together to market this lie, to get him away from their loved ones, to make it someone else’s problem?
I don’t know.
Let me know what you think
Ronda
