Medical board member exits over leaked memo

By Cy Ryan

Thursday, Oct. 8, 2009 | 2 a.m.

Gov. Jim Gibbons has agreed that a member of the Board of Medical Examiners should resign for leaking an internal board memo to the Las Vegas Sun.

Jean Stoess was asked to step down last week by Board Chairman Dr. Charles Held and Executive Secretary Louis Ling for breaking a board policy permitting only Ling to speak to the news media.

Stoess said Friday that she would resign. But by Monday she had put her resignation on hold, saying that before making a decision she wanted to hear from the governor.

She did the following day. “Stacy Woodbury of the governor’s office just said the governor wants me to resign because leaking confidential information cannot be condoned,” Stoess said.

“I don’t think I should resign, but who wants to stay on a board dealing with people like that?” she said.

Stoess, representing the general public on the board, had three years left on her term.

The leaked document was a memo from Ling to board members. It reviewed District Judge Kathleen Delaney’s recent decision to void the board’s emergency regulation allowing medical assistants to give flu shots. The judge held that the board had violated the open meeting law and exceeded its authority.

(The board ruled this week that medical assistants may give flu shots and other injections if they are supervised by a licensed physician.)

The copy of Ling’s memo obtained by the Sun showed no notation indicating it was confidential.

In an e-mail to Stoess asking for her resignation, Ling said some of his correspondence with the board is routine but includes items that are confidential.

“We must be able to trust that such communications will remain in confidence,” Ling said. “By your e-mail to (Sun reporter) Cy (Ryan), you indicated that you knew you were breaching that confidence and that you had done so before. Please seriously consider resigning.”

In a statement issued following Stoess’ resignation, Gibbons noted that medical board members have access to confidential patient medical information: “Any person appointed to the medical board by the governor must respect and adhere to the board’s policies regarding confidentiality and communications outside the agency.”

Assemblywoman Sheila Leslie, D-Reno, criticized Stoess’ departure. The medical board should not “muzzle” its members, she said.

The root of the board’s problems is not talking to the press, Leslie said.