Fwd of, off-topic anti-psych articles posted to the wrong NG, between Wed, 29 Mar 2000 19:43:27 GMT and Wed, 29 Mar 2000 20:06:18 GMT
PsychHunter
alt.religion.scientology posted between Wed, 29 Mar 2000 19:43:27 GMT
and Wed, 29 Mar 2000 20:06:18 GMT
FWD to a NG where this is in-topic
From: b__r...@my-deja.com
Date: Wed, 29 Mar 2000 19:43:27 GMT
Subject: First Lady's Concerns Over Ritalin Justified
Copyright 2000 News & Record (Greensboro, NC)
News & Record (Greensboro, NC)
March 25, 2000, Saturday, ALL EDITIONS
SECTION: EDITORIAL, Pg. A12, Editorial
LENGTH: 354 words
HEADLINE: FIRST LADY'S CONCERNS WORTH HEEDING ON RITALIN
BODY:
Maybe it was, maybe it wasn't. We could argue all day over whether
Hillary Rodham Clinton's speaking out on the increasing use of mind-
altering drugs by the very, very young was driven by her Senate
campaign.
Whatever her motivations, the plan the first lady outlined this week to
curb the use of Ritalin and similar medications on preschoolers can
only help scores of parents and children struggling with bothersome
behavioral problems that may or may not require medication.
Clinton wasn't the only one alarmed by a report last month in the
Journal of the American Medical Association that showed the number of 2-
to 4-year-olds on psychiatric drugs like Ritalin and anti-depressants
like Prozac soared 50 percent between 1991 and 1995.
While many critics are troubled by all use of such drugs, especially on
children, even advocates of medication to treat Attention Deficit
Hyperactivity Disorder were troubled by the latest findings because the
effects of such drugs on still-developing brains is largely unknown.
In response, Clinton met with Health and Human Services Secretary Donna
Shalala, Surgeon General David Satcher and other child and health
leaders before recommending the following common-sense initiatives:
Food and Drug Administration guidelines for the use of such drugs for
children younger than 6.
More clinical trials on young children.
A fall conference on children's mental health.
Handbooks for parents.
And training for doctors.
While no parent knowingly would endanger a child's development for the
mere convenience of better behavior, medications do provide a fix
that's far easier than making family lifestyle changes that can bring
about the same results.
An alert such as the one Clinton has sounded may be all it takes to
give pause to parents of preschool children showing signs of ADHD,
which doctors warn is extremely hard to even diagnose in toddlers.
During that pause, parents might explore such alternatives to drugs as
improving children's diets with more fruits and vegetables, and finding
ways to spend more quality time with them.
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From: b__r...@my-deja.com
Date: Wed, 29 Mar 2000 19:46:43 GMT
Subject: Ritalin -- Another view
I have posted the First Lady's concerns about Ritalin. Here is a
slightly different view about the subject, posted to give the issue
balance.
No one can disagree that the drugging of our children is cruel; but
there does seem to be an issue over the alternatives available -- a
discussion which merits further debate.
B
Copyright 2000 PR Newswire Association, Inc.
PR Newswire
March 29, 2000, Wednesday 10:11 AM Eastern Time
SECTION: DOMESTIC NEWS
DISTRIBUTION: TO NATIONAL, MEDICAL AND POLITICAL EDITORS
LENGTH: 806 words
HEADLINE: Neurologist Fred Baughman Jr. Criticizes White House Response
To U.S. Psychiatric Drugging Epidemic
DATELINE: LOS ANGELES, March 29
BODY:
The following is being issued by Dr. Fred Baughman Jr.:
On February 23, the "Journal of the American Medical Association"
reported that between 1991 to 1995, prescriptions for 2- to 4-year-olds
jumped threefold for Ritalin and two-fold for antidepressants such as
Prozac.
"Alarmed, the White House recently sought to reverse this dangerous
epidemic. Unfortunately, their package of 'reforms' will not limit the
drugging of preschoolers, but simply run 'damage control' on behalf of
the psychiatric/pharmaceutical cartel," according to pediatric
neurologist Dr. Fred Baughman Jr. "The administration is defending the
indefensible: the wholesale labeling and drugging of normal infants,
toddlers, and preschoolers -- normal, that is, until brain-altering,
psychiatric drugs course through their brains and bodies."
The White House initiative includes:
-- Inform parents and teachers about the risks of such drugs. However,
psychiatrists will not confess that neither the safety or efficacy of
their drugs have ever been established, that the drugs may be more
harmful than helpful, and that there can be no ethical justification
for the experimental drugging of normal children -- that is, children
with no demonstrable physical or chemical abnormality.
-- The FDA will develop new drug labels. Will the labels make it clear
that Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) for which these
psychoactive drugs are most prevalently prescribed, is not a bona fide
disease with a diagnosable abnormality in the child?
-- The National Institutes of Mental Health (NIMH) will begin a
nationwide study of Ritalin use in children under the age of six. Yet
this is based on the false premise that ADHD is an actual disease with
a confirmed physical or chemical abnormality. None have been found.
What's more, Ritalin is dangerous and addictive; as with all
amphetamines, withdrawal symptoms include suicidal ideation.
Furthermore, 15 years of brain scan research has shown the brains
of "ADHD" subjects to be 10% smaller than that of "normal" subjects.
Scarcely mentioned is the fact that the "ADHD" subjects were taking
Ritalin and that the Ritalin, not ADHD, is the likely cause of the
brain atrophy (shrinkage).
-- The Surgeon General will hold a conference on the diagnosis and
treatment of mental illness in very young children. Undoubtedly, this
will be biased in favor of the biopsychiatry/pharmaceutical cartel and
the recommendations predictable.
For example, Dr. Jane E. Henney, Commissioner of the FDA said that last
year her agency had sent letters to seven companies asking them to
study the effects of antidepressants in children. Is it any wonder that
virtually all such trials "prove" the drug in question to be "safe and
effective."
And a recent government guide for the treatment of young children with
mental disorders already concludes: "When medication is used, it should
not be the only strategy, but should be part of an overall treatment
plan." Declaring "the use of medication is not generally the first
option for a preschool child with a psychiatric disorder," it is
accepted as an option. Dr. Steven E. Hyman, director of NIMH concurs.
Furthermore, the Second Lady Tipper Gore, has insisted that we believe
in psychiatric disorders as "diseases" and "chemical imbalances."
Unfortunately, psychiatry's representation of emotional and mental
conditions being due to "chemical imbalances" is 100% fraud.
The government sanctioning of psychotropic drugs for behavior control --
or any part of a treatment plan -- in normal children ignores the fact
that children are capable of self-control with appropriate parenting
and education.
Even in Congressional hearings as early as 1970 on "Federal Involvement
in the Use of Behavior Modification Drugs on Grammar School
Children ...," John D. Griffith, assistant professor of psychiatry
testified, "I would like to point out that every drug, however
innocuous, has some degree of toxicity." A drug, he said, is a "type of
poison."
The fact of the matter -- a fact the country had better wake up to --
is that there is no abnormality to be found in any of
psychiatry's "diseases" and "chemical imbalances" do not exist -- not
in infants, not in toddlers, not in preschoolers, not in K-12, not at
any age. Without invented "diseases," the psychiatric-pharmaceutical
cartel would have nothing to treat. These are normal children with
disciplinary and educational problems that can and must be resolved
without recourse to drugs. Deceiving and drugging the normal is not the
practice of medicine. It is criminal.
SOURCE Dr. Fred Baughman Jr.
CONTACT: Dr. Fred Baughman Jr., fred-...@worldnet.att.net
URL: http://www.prnewswire.com
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH
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From: b__r...@my-deja.com
Date: Wed, 29 Mar 2000 19:47:58 GMT
Subject: The Psychiatric Racket Begins to Fold
Copyright 2000 The Dallas Morning News
The Dallas Morning News
View Related Topics
February 20, 2000, Sunday THIRD EDITION
SECTION: VIEWPOINTS; Pg. 6J; STACEY FREEDENTHAL
LENGTH: 780 words
HEADLINE: Psychiatric hospitals dying despite obvious need
BYLINE: Stacey Freedenthal
BODY:
The coffin in the psychiatric hospital actually was an empty cardboard
box wrapped in black paper, but the tears were genuine. Nurses, social
workers and other longtime employees wept at a mock funeral earlier
this month for the Charter psychiatric hospital in Austin.
Charter Behavioral Health System's departure from Austin is one of many
closings around the state, including three Charter hospitals in the
Dallas-Fort Worth area. And Charter isn't alone. Just about every year,
the number of psychiatric hospitals nationwide dwindles. In Austin, a
city of almost 700,000, only two private hospitals survive, and even
those hospitals have announced they might shut down or consolidate.
Hospitals aren't withering away for want of patients. Unfortunately,
depression, psychosis and chemical dependency afflict as many children
and adults today as they did 10 years ago, when psychiatric hospitals
flourished in Texas. I worked at Charter in Austin as an assessment
counselor, and the day before the hospital announced it was closing, I
turned away patients because we already had too many.
So why, then, are psychiatric hospitals going the way of drive-in movie
theaters and family farms?
It would be easy to blame the hospitals' endangered-species status on
managed care insurance companies, which have wrangled fees so low that
it is hard for hospitals to make a profit. That may be true, but the
ultimate reason that psychiatric hospitals are closing lies with the
hospitals themselves.
By most accounts, the activities of psychiatric hospitals in Texas are
ethical and legal. But that wasn't always true. Beginning more than 15
years ago, companies saw that an incredible amount of money could be
made in the mental health industry, and they went about making it.
Some Texas hospitals aggressively recruited patients with "bounty
hunters" and counselors who received commissions for referrals. Once
in, patients found themselves hospitalized for weeks, months and even
years. Reports festered about psychiatric hospitals coincidentally
deeming patients cured on the very day that their insurance benefits
ran out.
In the hospitals' heyday, it wasn't uncommon for insurance to pay $
1,000 a day for a hospital stay, plus fees for psychiatric visits,
group therapy sessions and other treatments. At one point, hospitals
charged for six or seven group-therapy sessions a day, according to
Armin Steege, chief executive officer of Charter-Austin. "We got
ourselves into this as an industry," he said at the mock funeral.
Finally, in the early 1990s, the public caught on to the abuses.
Insurance companies stopped paying inflated fees. Patients sued
hospitals. Governments assessed massive fines. The Legislature enacted
reforms. Few hospitals were immune.
The reforms were sorely needed, but they also cut into hospitals'
profits. For example, the Legislature passed a law requiring a
physician (and not merely a counselor or nurse) to evaluate each
patient before he could be admitted. That required hospitals to pay a
doctor around the clock for that purpose alone. And doctors, as we all
know, aren't cheap.
Still, if Texas psychiatric hospitals were their own worst enemy, then
managed care companies have come in a close second.
As the costs of running psychiatric hospitals have increased over the
years, the rate of reimbursement by insurance companies has decreased.
Managed care has refused to approve long admissions, and lengths of
stay that once averaged a month now average three to five days.
Many advocates for the mentally ill complain that, once again, the
industry is all about money, not patient care. This time, though,
insurers are the ones putting dollars first. Managed care's failure to
pay for long-term treatment - or, for that matter, short-term treatment
beyond a week or so - has produced a revolving door for many patients,
who relapse and return after too brief a stay.
So now psychiatric hospitals suffer a fate that some critics might see
as belatedly deserved, but the hospitals aren't the real victims.
Nurses, therapists and doctors who lose jobs will find new ones.
Corporations like Crescent Operating Co. of Fort Worth, which owns
Charter, will make their millions in other areas. Life will go on.
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From: b__r...@my-deja.com
Date: Wed, 29 Mar 2000 19:50:33 GMT
Subject: The Death of Charter Psych Hospitals
Copyright 2000 The Indianapolis Star
THE INDIANAPOLIS STAR
February 27, 2000, Sunday ,CITY FINAL EDITION
SECTION: BUSINESS; Pg. E01
LENGTH: 1826 words
HEADLINE: Deal led to collapse of Charter hospitals
Critics say 1997 sale strangled the psychiatric chain; financial
troubles led to 'pattern of neglect.'
BODY:
The nation's largest chain of psychiatric hospitals lies in tatters.
More than half of the roughly 90 hospitals and treatment centers
operated by Charter Behavioral Health Systems have closed, and the
company filed for bankruptcy court protection this month.
Three years ago, officials of a real estate investment trust headed by
Richard E. Rainwater, a financier based in Fort Worth, announced a $400
million investment that they said would breathe new life into Charter.
But rather than revitalizing the chain, the deal contributed to its
collapse, according to many former Charter officials, undermining
patient care in the process.
The company says that Charter's woes were caused by insurance cutbacks,
not by the 1997 plan, and that patient care was not affected.
The 1997 plan, though, saddled Charter Behavioral, a unit of Magellan
Health Services Inc., with some $125 million in franchise fees and
rapidly escalating rents.
The chain's former chief executive said he warned that the costs would
cause financial chaos. Those pressures, coupled with industrywide
insurance cutbacks, were soon felt in psychiatric wards, former company
officials said.
Hospital directors and workers, overworked and faced with repeated
salary freezes, quit. Wards had too few employees, federal and state
reports show. Training programs were eliminated, former company
officials said. Broken chairs and walls were not repaired.
"It felt like they were strip-mining this place," said Dr. Hashim
Hafez, the medical director at a Charter unit in Nashua, N.H., until he
quit last year.
Charter Behavioral, which once had units in 27 states caring for more
than 8,000 patients, many of them children, had long had a troubled
past.
But after 1997, patient care failed even at well-run hospitals,
according to regulators and former company executives.
As Charter's problems mounted, it began rapidly closing hospitals.
(Locations in South Bend and Lafayette, Indiana, closed last year, and
locations in Indianapolis, Hobart, Terre Haute and Jeffersonville
closed last month. The only Charter hospital remaining in Indiana is in
Fort Wayne.)
Former executives trace the tailspin to the deal with Rainwater. The
complex arrangement was intended to benefit both Rainwater's real
estate trust, the Crescent Real Estate Equities Company, and Magellan
Health.
Under the plan, the trust received income from lease payments and
Magellan received franchise fees.
In addition, Rainwater, as the largest shareholder in Magellan Health
at the time, stood to profit because the sale of the ailing chain
raised Magellan's stock price.
Magellan Health's top executive also got a large bonus, according to
filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Additionally, the plan enabled Magellan, the nation's largest
behavioral health company, to leave the hospital business for managed
health care, a more lucrative field.
The deal split ownership of Charter Behavioral between Magellan Health
and an affiliate of Crescent Real Estate. The psychiatric chain's
buildings were sold to Crescent Real Estate, which leased them back at
a healthy profit.
Both Rainwater -- a former business associate of Gov. George W. Bush
Jr. of Texas -- and Mac Crawford, the chief executive of Magellan
Health at the time of the deal, declined to be interviewed.
In written responses, their spokesmen said that Charter Behavioral's
financial woes were caused by insurance cutbacks, not by the 1997 plan.
They said patient care was not affected.
"Sure, we had falling resources," said Dr. Gary M. Henschen, the chief
medical officer of Charter Behavioral, which is based in Alpharetta,
Ga. "But we have done the best we can."
In late 1995, Rainwater and his wife, Darla Moore, paid $69.7 million
for a 12.3 percent stake in Magellan Health. The following year, he
approached Crawford about a deal for Magellan to sell Charter
Behavioral's buildings to Crescent.
Companies that operate nursing homes had engaged in similar "sale lease-
backs" to raise cash.
In the 1997 deal, Crescent Real Estate paid $400 million to acquire a
half-stake in Charter Behavioral and buy its buildings.
Because federal tax laws bar real estate investment trusts, or REITs,
from operating companies, Rainwater and his associates formed a
publicly traded company, Crescent Operating, to hold the half stake.
Under the deal, Charter Behavioral was required to pay Crescent Real
Estate $41.5 million in rent, a return of about 11 percent.
Gerald Haddock, a Crescent executive, described the lease returns
as "exceptional." The rent, which took precedence over franchise fees
to Magellan Health, escalated 5 percent annually.
Magellan Health, which is based in Columbia, Md., retained a 50 percent
stake in Charter Behavioral, which was to pay it $78 million annually
in franchise fees.
Magellan, which used cash from the sale to finance managed-care
acquisitions, said that those payments could decline if industrywide
insurance cuts continued.
At the time, most analysts applauded the plan. But John Lutzius, an
analyst with Green Street Advisors in Newport Beach, Calif., said
shortly after that the new payments left Charter Behavioral with little
cash to weather any problems.
"Between the franchise fees and the rent, Magellan and Crescent were
effectively sweeping all the cash flow from Charter," Lutzius said
recently.
Rainwater's bet on the psychiatric industry proved to be wrong. In
1997, some within Charter Behavioral had sounded warnings about the
deal's consequences.
In separate interviews, two former top Charter officials said John M.
DeStefanis, Charter's top executive, told Crawford of Magellan Health
that the franchise fee and rent payments would financially devastate
the psychiatric hospitals.
Not long after the deal closed, DeStefanis resigned, those former
officials said.
"John went nose to nose with them, and that's why he was forced out of
the company," said one former executive who spoke on the condition of
anonymity.
Asked about that account, De Stefanis confirmed it but declined further
comment, citing a confidentiality agreement.
In his statement, Crawford disputed this version of events, saying that
DeStefanis supported the deal. DeStefanis's departure was unrelated to
the deal, he said.
Magellan officials declined to comment on discussions with De
Stefanis. "In the course of negotiating any transaction, differing
viewpoints are always expressed, and, in a good organization, are even
encouraged," the company said.
Magellan executives said the deal would benefit Charter Behavioral;
Magellan's top official also profited. Crawford, whose salary in fiscal
1996 was $712,500, received a $2.48 million bonus for closing the deal,
according to Magellan Health's 1997 proxy statement.
Crawford described his cash payment as a "retention bonus." One company
director, A. D. Frazier Jr., said that he supported the payment to
Crawford because the 1997 deal moved Magellan toward managed care and
away from hospitals.
A month after the deal closed in June 1997, the federal government
further cut hospital reimbursements. That December, Magellan told
shareholders the move would cut the $78 million due in franchise fees
from Charter Behavioral in fiscal 1998 by a range of $10 million to $15
million.
DeStefanis's projections, however, proved far more accurate. Charter
Behavioral managed to pay only $32 million in fees that fiscal year. In
January 1998, seven months after the deal and 45 days after Magellan
issued its annual report, the chain made its last franchise payment.
Charter Behavioral had had a troubled record of patient care, including
settlements of government charges involving fraudulent billing.
Regulators said, however, that some units provided good care.
In early 1997, for example, Dr. Ronald Davidson, a hospital consultant
for the state of Illinois, declared he would not hesitate to use a
company center in Brown Deer, Wis., for his own child.
But by early 1998, conditions there and at other well-run units
worsened as the weakening chain imposed salary freezes, staff cutbacks
and other cost-cutting measures, said former executives, including
Cindy Musikantow, the former head of a Charter unit in Naperville, Ill.
At Charter's flagship hospital in Nashua, N.H., resources shrank and
staff levels fell, said Dr. Philip Santora, a former associate medical
director at the unit. When experienced nurses and therapists quit, they
were replaced by fresh graduates, he said.
In 1998 and 1999 reports, federal and New Hampshire regulators found
unsupervised children engaging in sex or hurting themselves at the
Nashua unit. Wards had too few employees. Suicide attempts were not
recorded, and children were improperly restrained.
Dr. Santora, who quit in August, said that while insurance cutbacks
played a role, the 1997 deal resulted in a pattern of neglect.
"You can chip away and chip away, and sooner or later you reach a
critical mass and a point of no return," he said.
As its hospitals veered out of control, Charter Behavioral's governing
board -- which was comprised of two executives from Magellan Health and
two associates of Rainwater -- had little response.
Dr. Clarissa Marques, Magellan Health's chief clinical officer, joined
the board in August 1998 and found it had never received or asked for
patient care reports.
John C. Goff, one of Rainwater's closest associates, who headed the
board then, declined to comment.
In mid-1998, Crawford left Magellan Health to become chief executive of
Caremark Rx of Birmingham, Ala.
About that time, in an Securities and Exchange Commission filing,
Crescent Operating -- which along with Magellan had lent some money to
Charter -- acknowledged that Charter's operating losses were growing
because of insurance cutbacks and the rents and fees the 1997 deal
required.
In November 1998, Goff resigned from Charter Behavioral's board.
Last April, 60 Minutes II broadcast the results of an undercover
investigation at several Charter Behavioral units. Footage showed ill-
trained employees crudely restraining teen-agers and filling in medical
records for patients who apparently had not been examined.
Several company hospitals were already under government scrutiny. After
the broadcast, federal officials announced an investigation. The probe
involves activities both before and after the 1997 deal and is not
focused on finances.
Vowing to improve patient care, Charter Behavioral hired outside
consultants. Regulators shut some units. The company closed others.
By last August, Charter Behavioral could no longer make lease payments.
The next month, Magellan transferred most of its remaining stake in
Charter to Crescent Operating. Magellan and Charter agreed to indemnify
each other in the face of the investigations.
In December, Charter said it would reorganize and sell some 50 units.
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From: b__r...@my-deja.com
Date: Wed, 29 Mar 2000 19:51:48 GMT
Subject: Your tax dollars at work
Your tax dollars at work:
<http://www.mk-resistance.com>
Interesting site
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From: b__r...@my-deja.com
Date: Wed, 29 Mar 2000 19:53:41 GMT
Subject: Psychiatry kills and then wonders where the bodies come from
January 1985 .. New York State Commission on Quality of Care
In the Matter of Christopher Dugan -
A Patient at South Beach Psychiatric Center
There is an urgent need for the State Office of Mental Health to
conduct clinical research on the phenomenon of sudden deaths among
young and agitated, but otherwise healthy, psychiatric center patients,
according to this Commission report on the death of a patient at South
Beach Psychiatric Center during the process of being restrained. The
Commission noted concern that eight able-bodied South Beach Psychiatric
Center male staff trained in management of aggressive patients could
not manage an out-of-control delusional patient referred to in the
report by the pseudonym of Christopher Dugan. The Commission and Mental
Hygiene Medical Review Board concluded that the cause of death was
cardiac arrest as a result of exhaustion, possibly affected by the
medications received by the patient. The Commission found no credible
evidence that excessive force was used or of an intent to injure the
patient.
Despite an allegation by one staff witness that excess force was used
during the restraint, the report indicates no credible evidence was
found through either its exhaustive investigation, hearings at which
staff witnesses were examined or the autopsy reports, to substantiate a
conclusion that undue force was applied. This is in contrast to several
previous Commission reports on deaths of patients at South Beach
Psychiatric Center who died while in restraint or seclusion which
criticized staff actions and cited significant deficiencies in
restraint and seclusion practices at the psychiatric center. In a
follow-up report issued last August, the Commission indicated South
Beach Psychiatric Center had made significant progress toward upgrading
the quality of care afforded patients, including restraint and
seclusion practices.
In addition to the concern voiced over the inability of eight trained
ward staff to manage this patient, the Commission raises questions
concerning administration of a maximum dosage of a powerful
psychotherapeutic drug to this patient, who was already on high dosages
of other tranquilizing medications.
In concert with its recommendation that the Office of Mental Health
undertake clinical review and research of the phenomenon of sudden
deaths among young, agitated patients to identify critical risk factors
associated with such deaths, the Commission's report specifically urges
South Beach Psychiatric Center to ensure that procedures are in place
to inform staff responsible for the supervision of patients of any
risks posed by particular patients whose psychiatric status may be
fragile.
The State Office of Mental Health generally concurred with the
Commission findings and recommendations and indicated in a response
appended to the report the actions it has taken to research restraint
and seclusion in State psychiatric centers, as well as the specific
actions taken at South Beach Psychiatric Center.
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From: b__r...@my-deja.com
Date: Wed, 29 Mar 2000 19:56:16 GMT
Subject: Thr Criminal Cult of Psychiatry
Psychiatric hospitals accused of holding patients captive in Fla.
Associated Press
TAMPA -- Patients coming to Florida for treatment of problems with
alcohol, food or relationships brought their tennis rackets and golf
clubs, expecting leisurely stays at luxurious resorts or health spas.
Instead, they found themselves admitted to psychiatric hospitals, mis-
diagnosed and held captive until their health insurance ran out, major
insurers charged in a lawsuit filed against a group of Florida clinics.
Insurers said the scheme cost them $39 million during five years.--
Some patients "who had no mental health problems ... arrived in Florida
completely unaware that the limousine that met them at the airport was
taking them to a psychiatric hospital," the federal suit filed Thursday
said.
To discourage patients from leaving before their benefits were
exhausted, airline tickets were withheld, the lawsuit said In one case,
a patient was medicated to prevent his departure. In another, a
couple's children were medicated.
The lawsuit names Largo's Sun Coast Hospital; Northpointe Behavioral
Health System, also known as the Manors, in Tarpon Springs; Heritage
Beverly Hills Hospital in Lecanto; and the Retreat psychiatric hospital
in Broward County.
Officials of the facilities did not return calls or refused to comment
Thursday and Friday.
The lawsuit follows two years of investigation by Prudential Insurance
Co. of America and MetraHealth Insurance Co., formerly Metropolitan and
Travelers, said Thomas W. Queen, a Washington lawyer representing them.
"The investigation revealed the practices, and the companies were
appalled by those practices," Queen said. "The companies are committed
to identifying and combating health-care fraud."
Patients were recruited -- one freelance recruiter charged clinics
$3,000 per patient--diagnosed with mental illnesses and treated based
on their coverage rather than a psychiatric condition, according to the
lawsuit.
It detailed 14 incidents, among them:
_An Ohio railway worker injured his neck and shoulder but a union
representative, who reportedly took a kickback, persuaded him to seek
treatment in Florida for alcohol abuse.
The worker was given plane tickets and told his insurance co-payment
would be waived. He found out later that the Manors psychiatric
hospital diagnosed him as depressed. He was told he'd receive his
ticket home only if he stayed for 30 days. The only treatment he
received was massages.
_ A New Mexico woman seeking treatment for an eating disorder was told
she was going to a health spa.
She "had no idea that she would be going to a hospital," the lawsuit
says. At Heritage, there was no supervision of her diet, she received
no counseling, and her exercise was limited to walks around the
building.
"Although she had been promised a 30-day program, (she) was suddenly
discharged after 15 days when Travelers stopped paying for treatment."
Saturday, December 14, 1996
The Arizona Republic
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From: b__r...@my-deja.com
Date: Wed, 29 Mar 2000 19:58:03 GMT
Subject: Thr Criminal Cult of Psychiatry -- fraud
Fiscal Abuses Alleged at Queens Not-For-Profit Psychiatric Clinic
A Commission investigation of financial and programmatic practices at
the Queens County Neuropsychiatric Institute, Inc. (QCNI), a not-for-
profit psychiatric clinic serving primarily low income clients with
Medicaid funds, revealed some $600,000 in improper Medicaid billings,
the diversion of agency assets to senior executives, concealment of
financial irregularities by the agency's CPA, the failure of its board
of directors to carry out their responsibilities and protect the
agency, and serious problems in the quality of the high-volume clinic's
services.
The Commission's investigation found major deficiencies in the areas of:
n Medicaid Billings: There were $600,000 in improper clinic Medicaid
billings out of $3.2 million claimed for psychiatric services from 1992-
94 because records failed to meet federal and state legal requirements
on documentation and legibility.
n Executive Compensation: Excessive compensation and large, unjustified
and unauthorized payments were made to the founder, who spent
substantial amounts of time at his Florida residence, and compensation
of other senior executives was questionable. From 1992-1995, almost 28
percent of the program's income went to its senior executives, and
almost a half million dollars in agency assets were misappropriated by
the founder between 1982-1994. The founder had a rent-free apartment in
the clinic building and was also granted a minimum of $600,000 in
retirement benefits, which substantially weakened the not-for-profit
agency's finances. The medical director was simultaneously employed as
a full-time psychiatrist at Bronx Children's Psychiatric Center,
enrolled there in its Extra Service Program for additional work, and
employed by QCNI or paid as a consultant. He received compensation of
$249,000 in 1994 and $229,000 in 1995 from QCNI, a private hospital,
and the state for work weeks averaging 83 hours. There were many
periods when he reportedly was working at two different locations at
the same time, or working more than 24 hours in a single day,
suggesting that he could not have worked all the hours for which he was
paid.
n Board of Directors: The board failed to oversee the agency and
protect its assets, and failed to comply with laws and regulations
(e.g. annual independent audits and approval of business transactions
with agency executives) to prevent dissipation of corporate funds and
assets for the benefit of agency executives.
n CPA Misconduct: QCNI's CPA firm participated in a scheme to redirect
public funds intended for services to the agency's founder; attempted
to conceal the misappropriation of $490,000 through improper accounting
entries and by assuring that an audit had been done and that the
financial statements were not misleading when, in fact, no audit was
performed; and, failed to accurately report employee compensation to
state and federal tax agencies.
n Quality of Services: There was no evidence that many of the patients
were even eligible for mental health services; no treatment plans in a
third of the cases reviewed; missing medical status information which
placed patients on psychotropic drugs at risk of harm; illegible
treatment records; and chronic treatment and record deficiencies which
were not addressed by supervisors.
As in several previous investigations1, the Commission uncovered a not-
for-profit-agency certified to provide care and treatment to persons
with mental illness, but which subordinated its avowed beneficent
purpose "to become an engine for the personal enrichment of its
corporate principal." The Commission's report, Profit Making in Not-For-
Profit Care: Part III, The Case of Queens County Neuropsychiatric
Institute, Inc., identified the common ingredients characterizing such
diversions of public funds to private profit as including:
n A dominant person in a position of leadership–in this case a
psychiatrist who was the founder of the agency–who engaged in or
directed financial decisions for his own personal benefit;
n A weak board of directors that either did not grasp its fiduciary
responsibilities or failed to carry them out vigilantly; and
n An accountant who failed to meet his professional responsibilities in
conducting independent audits and in providing unbiased financial
opinions. Instead, the accountant helped conceal from the board and the
certifying agency, the State Office of Mental Health (OMH), material
financial transactions that diverted agency assets to the founder.
In addition to recommendations to OMH to address problems at QCNI, the
Commission referred its findings to the Department of Law for
recoupment of misappropriated corporate funds and for possible criminal
action regarding apparent frauds against the corporation, as well as to
reorganize its board of directors; to the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern
District of New York for possible criminal prosecution related to
misappropriation of medical assistance funds; to the State Education
Department for apparent gross violations of public accountancy
regulations; to the Department of Social Services for recoupment of
$600,000 in medical assistance payments improperly received by QCNI; to
the OMH for review of outside employment practices by employees
participating in its Extra Service Compensation Program; to the IRS and
to State Tax and Finance for possible tax law violations; and to the
State Inspector General for possible falsification of state time and
attendance records by the QCNI medical director, who was also a state
employee and reported working at two locations at the same time.
While conducting a recent review of freestanding mental health clinics,
Commission fiscal staff visited clinics throughout the state to look
behind reported cost and productivity figures to gain an understanding
of high and low-cost clinic operating practices.2 "With the hope of
replicating sound operating practices statewide, the Commission visited
QCNI because it appeared to be one of the more efficient clinics
licensed by OMH, with 1992 costs per 30-minute individual psychotherapy
session at less than one-half of the statewide average, and clinician
visits per day almost three times the statewide clinic average. But the
Commission's review determined that this seeming efficiency concealed a
clinic program rife with serious problems," said Commission Chairman,
Clarence J. Sundram.
The delivery of community-based mental health services in New York
State relies heavily on a network of not-for-profit agencies that
operate residential and non-residential programs to meet the needs of
persons with mental illness and their families. In doing so, the State
relies upon the mission and commitment of these agencies to the care
and treatment of persons with mental illness, upon their boards of
directors to maintain vigilance in carrying out their mission, and upon
independent accountants who are required by law to provide accurate
annual reports on the financial condition of these agencies which are
largely financed with public funds. For the most part, not-for-profit
agencies have proven to be reliable, dependable and cost-effective
partners with state and local government agencies in meeting the needs
of persons with mental illness and their families for high quality
services in the community.
The sheer number of agencies involved in the delivery of these
services, and the limited staff within the Office of Mental Health
(OMH) who are assigned to responsibility for certification and
monitoring of these agencies makes the State heavily dependant upon the
reliability of each link in this chain of accountability. As the state
continues to implement a policy of downsizing government and de-
regulation of the service system, the Commission asserted this
dependence will necessarily increase.
In response to a draft of the Commission report, the OMH generally
concurred with the Commission's findings.
Endnotes
1 Profit Making in Not-for-Profit Care: A Review of the Operations and
Financial Practices of Brooklyn Psychosocial Rehabilitation Institute,
Inc., October 1986; Profit Making in Not-for-Profit Corporations: A
Challenge to Regulators, December 1989; Exploiting the Vulnerable: The
Case of HI-LI Manor Home for the Aged and Regulation by the NYS
Department of Social Services, May 1992; Missing Accountability: The
Case of Community Living Alternative, Inc., June 1994.
2 Why do Psychiatric Clinic Costs Vary by 1030%?: A Review of the
Efficiency of Freestanding Clinics, May 1996
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========
From: b__r...@my-deja.com
Date: Wed, 29 Mar 2000 20:06:18 GMT
Subject: Re: How's it going Stern
Hey mental patient: Up the dosage some. You're losing it, buddy boy.
I don't know what you're talking about when you mention silencing the
news group. There are plenty of opportunities here for you to
participate in meaningful discussions. You could defend the practice
of drugging and shocking kids. You could discuss your own experiences
as a mental patient. You could talk about how much you feel
stigmatized by the new program Wonderland that casts all mental
patients as dangerous and violent criminals.
Take your pick.
But take your medication first. You get terribly frantic when you don't.
B
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Before you buy.
--
http://www.cchr.org
http://scientology.org
http://parishioners.org
http://freedommag.org
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