Nevada ranked poor in handling doctor discipline

Friday, April 22, 2005 | 9:39 a.m.

CARSON CITY -- Nevada ranks among the worst states in the nation in taking serious disciplinary action against errant doctors, a health research group says.

Public Citizen, in a report issued today, said Nevada disciplined two doctors per 1,000 physicians in actions from 2002 to 2004. It was 46th in the nation in the rate of disciplinary action, down from 21st for the period of 1993-1995.

Hawaii had the worst record at 1.44 actions per 1,000 physicians while Wyoming had the highest rate at 10 disciplinary actions per 1,000 doctors.

Dr. Sidney Wolfe, director of Public Citizen's Health Research Group, said this data "again raises serious questions about the extent to which patients in many of these states with poorer record of serious doctor discipline are being protected from physicians who might well be barred from practice in states with boards that are doing a better job of disciplining physicians."

"It is quite possible that patients are being injured or killed more often in states with poor doctor disciplinary record than in states with consistently high performance," Wolfe said.

Tony Clark, who became executive director of the Nevada State Board of Medical Examiners last year, said the statistics reported by Public Citizen were correct for the time period covered.

But, he added, the board is "not allowing inappropriate behavior" by doctors.

He quipped that he didn't think Public Citizen would be satisfied unless the board "drawed and quartered" 600 physicians a year. Clark allowed that the disciplinary cases have not been handled as "expeditiously as I like."

He said the board is "catching up on disciplinary cases." He noted that there had been five disciplinary hearings in the last four weeks for doctors.

The board issued a summary suspension of the license of Dr. David Evans of Las Vegas on Dec. 28, 2004; revoked the respiratory therapy license of Forrest Scott on March 4; suspended the license of Dr. Tarek Greiss of Las Vegas on March 25 and reached a settlement on a complaint with Dr. Khilnani Suresh on March 4 in which he had to take 10 hours of training and pay a costs of $2,500.

Last year, he said, there were only two hearings. Many of these disciplinary cases are backed up because of delays in getting experts to appear or requests by doctors for continuances.

For instance, the board held a hearing this week on a complaint that two children were victims in 1998 and the complaint was filed in 2001. He said the doctor "kept getting continuances."

"We're cleaning things up as go along," Clark said referring to the old pending cases.

In the last six months the board has revoked one license, settled two cases, issued three emergency suspensions of licenses pending investigation, denied three licenses, dismissed one complaint, has three cases pending settlement and has held six hearings but no decision has been made on a potential penalty, Clark said.

There are more than 5,000 doctors licensed to practice in Nevada. About 4,000 are practicing here and others are based out of state, Clark said.

For the purposes of its report, Public Citizen classified as "serious disciplinary actions" revocations, surrenders, suspension, probation and restrictions on medical licenses.

The group said the number of serious disciplines per 1,000 physicians in the 10 worst states were: Hawaii, 1.44; Delaware, 1.54; Wisconsin, 1.70; Minnesota, 1.74; Maryland, 1.94; Nevada, 2; Rhode Island, 2.09; Arkansas, 2.11; South Carolina, 2.1; and Washington, 2.2.

In addition to Wyoming, Public Citizen said the best states include: Kentucky, 9.32 actions per 1,000 physicians; North Dakota, 7.65; Alaska, 7.44; Oklahoma, 6.95; Arizona, 6.68; Ohio, 6.64; Montana, 6.40; Colorado, 6.18 and West Virginia, 5.33.