01/05/2018
RESPONSES/COMMENTS (NON-CLINICAL)
From: Name Withheld
Dr. Willner has worked very hard over the years to point out the Kafkaesque nature of the NPDB (as has the Semmelweis Society International). The only issue I take issue with would be his comparison of the NPDB to the work of Senator Joseph McCarthy. Once the Verona letters were in hand and translated/decoded, every, single individual named by McCarthy was not only identified as a Soviet plant, but had their Soviet handler identified as well. No such vindication is forthcoming for the NPDB. According to the GAO reports of 1990, 1993, and 2000, approximately 40% of the information in the NPDB is incorrect. I doubt that the percentage has improved over time. We are used to the inefficiencies of Federal Agencies, but name me another organization which could have as much as a 40% failure rate and still exist…and on the taxpayer dime?
It is very much the case that reports can and very often are arbitrary, simply punitive, and serve no purpose in the furtherance of “protecting the community”. A nice read on this would include: B. Abbott Goldberg, The Peer Review Privilege: A Law in Search of a Valid Policy, 10 AM. J.L. & MED. 151, 154 (1984). I believe—from my own experience of the process and the lack of recourse once reported by an organization who made up the charges in retaliation for reporting a negligent homicide at their facility—that the NPDB is as malignant an organization as the EPA or the Bureau of Land Management and should be abolished. Every once in a while, a doctor prevails, but the Poliner cases out there are very rare.
Name Withheld
RESPONSES/COMMENTS (NON-CLINICAL)
From: Name Withheld
Dr. Willner has worked very hard over the years to point out the Kafkaesque nature of the NPDB (as has the Semmelweis Society International). The only issue I take issue with would be his comparison of the NPDB to the work of Senator Joseph McCarthy. Once the Verona letters were in hand and translated/decoded, every, single individual named by McCarthy was not only identified as a Soviet plant, but had their Soviet handler identified as well. No such vindication is forthcoming for the NPDB. According to the GAO reports of 1990, 1993, and 2000, approximately 40% of the information in the NPDB is incorrect. I doubt that the percentage has improved over time. We are used to the inefficiencies of Federal Agencies, but name me another organization which could have as much as a 40% failure rate and still exist…and on the taxpayer dime?
It is very much the case that reports can and very often are arbitrary, simply punitive, and serve no purpose in the furtherance of “protecting the community”. A nice read on this would include: B. Abbott Goldberg, The Peer Review Privilege: A Law in Search of a Valid Policy, 10 AM. J.L. & MED. 151, 154 (1984). I believe—from my own experience of the process and the lack of recourse once reported by an organization who made up the charges in retaliation for reporting a negligent homicide at their facility—that the NPDB is as malignant an organization as the EPA or the Bureau of Land Management and should be abolished. Every once in a while, a doctor prevails, but the Poliner cases out there are very rare.
Name Withheld