Ten doctors lose licenses in 1999

Tuesday, April 11, 2000 | 10:18 a.m.

CARSON CITY -- Ten doctors lost their licenses in Nevada last year for misconduct or malpractice, the highest number since 1985, the state Board of Medical Examiners said.

Executive Director Larry Lessly said results released in an annual report do not suggest a toughening of penalties in Nevada.

"It was an average year," Lessly said. "This is where we like to be. We're never at the top of the heap. And we're never at the bottom."

The board said the licenses of eight physicians were revoked each in 1998 and 1997.

Lessly said Nevada has the nation's toughest law for licensing physicians. They are required to complete three years of post- graduate training before they can be licensed.

In past years, doctors who got into trouble in other states would "come running to Nevada," Lessly said. But a nationwide computer hookup allows the states to keep track of errant doctors and prevent them from hopping from state to state.

The report shows that 99.9 percent of those who take the Nevada test to practice medicine pass, the same percentage as in 1998. And in 1997, 100 percent of those tested passed.

Those who don't have the qualifications or have a questionable background are headed off at the application stage and don't get to take the test, Lessly said.

There were 3,113 active physician licenses in the state in 1999 or one doctor for every 100,000 residents. Lessly said the number of doctors in Nevada has risen as the population increased.

Only two counties -- Storey and Esmeralda -- didn't have any licensed physicians. The examiners board said 2,023 doctors were licensed in Clark County, about 65 percent of the physicians in Nevada.