Doctors who performed experiments on the patients.

[Raymond]

On going case alleges hospital was performing secret experiments on
patients

SEE Malpractice health issues
Published under Medical Malpractice by Jennifer Keel

Many Americans believe spending time in the hospital will relieve
health issues that they came in to solve. Most of the time this is the
case, but that wasn't the case for 17 patients that were checked into
the Pomona Valley Hospital in California. The hospital is in an
ongoing medical malpractice case regarding doctors who performed
experiments on the patients.

The medical center began conducting secret experiments on patients
that entered the hospital in 2008 and didn’t stop for 3 years. Doctors
used a medical device to promote bone growth in areas where there was
no bone, which has not been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug
Administration. Allegations against the hospital include negligence,
fraud, breach of express and implied warranty, medical malpractice and
strict liability, according to court documents.

April Cabana, a patient that was involved in the procedures alleges
her surgeon used a mixture of two products, Calstrux and OP-l,
manufactured by a company called Stryker Biotech. The combination of
the two products was known to lead to unwanted bone growth. The
company used off-label and illegal promotion of the mixture for
financial gain.

Cabana, 35, of Alta Loma underwent surgery at the medical center after
a car collision four years ago. She noticed a bone growth at the site
of her surgery afterwards, which caused excruciating pain because the
bone migrated to a nerve channel. Ali H. Mesiwala was the doctor who
conducted surgery on Cabana, according to the San Gabriel Valley
Tribune.

The doctor is accused with medical negligence. A situation that Cabana
thought was isolated was later discovered to be only one of 17. While
under oath, hospital officials revealed the product had not been
approved for testing, and three letters stated the hospital approved
the use of the products and the conducting of experiments. Stryker
Biotech, LLC, Stryker Corporation, Medtronic Sofamor Danek USA Inc.
and Medtronic Inc. are the medical device manufacturers named in the
lawsuit.

The only known patient this far in the case is Cabana. She had to
undergo another surgery to remove the “bone of unknown origin” from
her lower back, which resulted in further damage and pain to her
spine. During her second surgery, the doctor used a device called
Infuse Bone Graft manufactured by Medtronic, Inc., which was also
promoting its off-label devices illegally. The woman has since had to
undergo additional corrective surgeries, which has left her unable to
work, unable to be mobile and she has been placed on disability.

The FDA issued a warning against Infuse Bone Graft in July 2008, but a
new report says the medical device may cause additional damage. The
implant, which was created to release a genetically modified protein
into the body, was found to prompt other complications 2 to 14 days
after a procedure.

A report from the FDA stated: “These complications were associated
with swelling of neck and throat tissue, which resulted in compression
of the airway and/or neurological structures in the neck. Some reports
describe difficulty swallowing, breathing or speaking. Severe
dysphagia following cervical spine fusion using rhBMP products has
also been reported in the literature.”

Medtronic, Inc. was also reported to have been paying millions of
dollars in consulting fees and royalty payments to doctors to conduct
studies on the devices. Dr. Kenneth Burkus, who practices in Columbus,
Ga., and Dr. Thomas Zdeblick, a professor at the University of
Wisconsin were two doctors that allegedly were involved, according to
a reports in the New York Times.

[Raymond]

Quack, quack: 80 patients put in danger by doctor who falsified
credentials
According to court documents, the lawsuit involved 80 patients, four
of whom died.

Published under Medical Malpractice by Jennifer Keel

Last summer an Alamogordo, New Mexico, hospital, Gerald Champion
Regional Medical Center, was forced to file bankruptcy because of 80
medical malpractice claims it had against it and two of its
physicians. The doctor at the center of the controversy is Dr.
Christian Schlicht, an anesthesiologist and pain management specialist
who allegedly lied about his credentials and performed surgeries he
was not qualified for.

Another doctor involved in the controversy is Dr. Frank Bryant, an
orthopedic surgeon who sometimes performed surgeries with Schlicht.
Bryant, until Schlicht confessed to him in 2008, was not aware of the
falsified credentials Schlicht claimed, according to The Albuquerque
Journal. Dr. Schlicht wasn’t a surgeon and performed a procedure that
posed as a hazard to patients.

Plexiglas-like cement injured several patients involved in the
lawsuit. The substance was supposed to serve as a cushion between
spinal discs to relieve pain, but the cement seeped into other areas
of the spine before hardening, or in some cases hardened and then
later cracked. The procedure caused pain and injury to several
patients, and an operating room nurse tried to warn a supervisor of
the surgeries, saying they had gone too far. According to court
documents, the supervisor urged the nurse to let it be.

"He confided in me that some of his neurosurgery training was
falsified," Bryant recalled during a deposition earlier in the year
according to The Albuquerque Journal. "I wanted to just die right
there in the room. I didn't know what to do."

The settlement will allow the hospital to emerge from bankruptcy
protection. According to court documents, the lawsuit involved 80
patients, four of whom died, and out of those four at least one death
was caused by the cement injections. The settlement, which totaled
more than $33 million, was broken into three parts. Quorum Health
Resources LLC, a national health insurance firm that manages more than
150 hospitals, and another insurance company, which was not named,
will pay $13.5 million. The hospital will pay $7.5 million over three
years and Bryant will pay $11.5 million.

Schlicht left the country last year to serve as a senior flight
surgeon at a U.S. Air Force base in Japan, and his license in New
Mexico has expired, according to the publication.

[Raymond]

> Mexico has expired, according to the publication.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

Medicare fraud outrageous and must be stopped | Sun Journal
Even a small percentage of fraud can add up to a very large number.

It’s like mugging grandma, then beating a taxpayer with a rubber hose.

Few things are more maddening than people stealing public benefits.
It’s doubly so when those people are medical professionals who could
be earning a handsome living by operating on the right side of the
law.

Wednesday, 700 law enforcement agents arrested more than 100 people
accused of stealing more than $225 million from Medicare. This was
only two days after 21 people were arrested in Miami for bilking
taxpayers out of $200 million.

The arrests are the latest in a series of busts over the past two
years intended to curb what authorities think is between $60 and $90
billion in fraud each year.

Ten years ago, it was widely believed that fraud was a relatively
small part of overall Medicare spending, perhaps in the range of 2 to
3 percent.

But Medicare and Medicaid cost taxpayers $800 billion in 2010 and
consumed 23 percent of the federal budget. So even a small percentage
of fraud can add up to a very large number.

Authorities estimate that 10 percent of Medicare and Medicaid payments
are fraudulent, meaning we could be losing $80 billion a year to
medical thieves, a serious sum, even by federal standards.

The 111 arrested Wednesday were doctors, nurses and physical
therapists in nine U.S. cities.

The spike in Medicare and Medicaid busts is welcome and long overdue,
and no part of the country should be spared.

Federal officials have, in fact, made several Medicare and Medicaid
fraud arrests locally, including the conviction of a Harrison woman
for stealing more than $4 million.

Her partially completed lakeside luxury home was auctioned to the
highest bidder last week to help offset what she stole from taxpayers.

Two things may account for the upswing in major medical fraud cases.

First, Medicare long operated as a “pay-and-chase” system which paid
providers first and investigated suspicious claims afterward.

That worked well when hospitals and other large providers were the
main recipients of Medicare funding.

As the program expanded and services became more dispersed, it became
easier for rogue operators to quickly set up shop, bill Medicare for a
few months, then shut down.

What’s clearly needed is more vigorous screening of providers before
they ever receive a Medicare or Medicaid payment and more rapid
detection of suspicious providers.

Second, we now seem to live in a society with tremendous income
inequality, which has allowed some Americans to live like proverbial
kings.

It is now, apparently, not enough to make four or five times as much
as the average working American. Some people only seem satisfied when
their annual incomes are measured in the millions, rather than
hundreds of thousands.

These are premeditated crimes committed by people smart enough to
weigh the risks and rewards.

That makes this an area where longer prison sentences, not just
probation, combined with tougher enforcement can have a significant
deterrent effect.

Taxpayers must demand these programs do better.

rrho...@sunjournal.com

The opinions expressed in this column reflect the views of the
ownership and editorial board.
http://www.sunjournal.com/our-view/story/1085300

[Earl Evleth]

On 10/08/12 9:26, in article
33e5564a-0c2c-459e...@n18g2000yqn.googlegroups.com, "Raymond"

<Bluer...@aol.com> wrote:

> The hospital is in an
> ongoing medical malpractice case regarding doctors who performed
> experiments on the patients.

I don't know why they have to be sneaky about it. I have been
"experimented" on for years, but I signed all sorts of documents
(and read them) and was told verbally what they were trying to do.

The problem is that if one has a fatal disorder one is likely
to try anything. I got lucky, my experimental drug did slow
down the disease I have so they did not lie to me.

One feature of French medical law is that the patient has
the right not to inform one's lab test results to the doctor
who prescribed it. All test results first go to the patient
and it is responsibility of the patients to pass
these on to one's doctor. And one has the right to inspect
one's medical file. My own is thick since nearly 4 years
of serving as a guinea pig it has grown.

[Justin Timberlake]

Todd Akin has assured me that we guys can't get pregnant if we're
forcibly butt-fucked.

That's way reassuring!

Of course, I've never been forcibly ass-fucked myself.

All I ask for is "e a s y ..."