According to Chris Rauber, Kaiser says the press release announcing Halvorson's resignation is a fake. Now let the conspiracy theories about who posted it and why begin...
Huh. I just noticed the Rauber article mentions that the press release was sent to the Business Times. Someone really put a lot of effort into this. Or did Kaiser someone dictate the article to Rauber? Because this later version of the article omits the part about the press release being sent to the Business Times.
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Bruce Friedman of Lab Soft News has his finger on the pulse of the EMR game. I'm sure it's mere coincidence that his scenario covers the highlights of the recent Kaiserpocalypse. I just saw a comment that pointed out that the Department of Defense has been wasting $5-$6 billion dollars of the taxpayer's money on an even bigger EMR disaster. And, quel surprise, the honcho in charge, William Winkenwerder Jr., comes from the Kaiser ranks. This perhaps explains why he tried to fix the EMR's problems by changing the name/acronym from CHCS II to AHLTA. ;-)
I wonder how much Kaiser is paying this guy?
Today's KP LAWYER WATCH is a sordid story of what happens when Kaiser doctors, who enroll their families in the Kaiser system, get tumbled into the arbitration system. A Kaiser doctor's wife suffered renal failure, and he determined it was because she had been given the wrong drug. Being a doctor, he thought he could just point this out to the arbitrator. However, the Kaiser lawyers argued that his specialty didn't cover his wife's condition, so he couldn't qualify as a medical expert. For some strange reason the arbitration judge bought the doctors-don't-know-anything-beyond-their-narrow-specialty argument, so the doctor then went to the regular court system to try to address the unfairness of the arbitration process. It looks like he didn't hire a lawyer - probably because he figured the judges in the regular court system would notice he had a medical degree and quickly order a new arbitration. The plaintiffs evidently lost their court case - the document below is from their appeal, which concluded just a couple of weeks ago.
Considering that the judges admit that they refused to look at certain evidence and could only act within a very narrow sphere and are supposed to give pro per plaintiffs the maximum latitude, this judicial opinion is incredibly mean-spirited and rude. Also keep in mind the plaintiffs were paying to be trashed - the court system is ridiculously expensive even without a lawyer. I think the plaintiffs should speedily complain to the nearest judicial oversight commission (though they will probably just stick up for their brother-in-robes, too).
I'm going to highlight in bold where the judges turn "judgmental", despite the fact their own point is they don't really know what happened. Click on the link below to get the full text (it's long - practically the whole document):
( Check out the Judges-Turned-Mega-Jerks... )
For people who have never been through Kaiser's arbitration process, this might look like a situation of he-said she-said that somehow defaults to support the arbitration judge. However, once you talk to a few people who have actually been through Kaiser's arbitration process, you will find the same issues coming up time and time after time: Kaiser doctors lied, Kaiser lawyers played dirty tricks, and the arbitrator showed favoritism toward Kaiser by refusing to acknowledge or address these problems.
To give a specific example from an arbitration that's going on right now: I know a woman who was the victim of a blatant HIPAA violation by Kaiser - and she has the evidence to show that Kaiser's lawyer lied about how the violation happened, too. However, par for the course, neither the Feds or State agencies are addressing the matter swiftly. When she attempted to complain to the Bar Association, she was told "the matter does not warrant disciplinary action." The problem is that this HIPAA violation has corrupted the arbitration process, and the woman, who was abandoned by a slacker lawyer, is now stuck representing herself and the arbitration judge isn't listening to her. So what will probably happen is that the woman will be shafted by the arbitration process, and then if she attempts to go to the regular courts, she will be treated like dirt (like the plaintiff horror story above).
In sum, judges in the regular court system seem unaware of the widespread perception of fraud and corruption in the arbitration process, supported as far as I can tell by every patient ever forced to go through that process, and in the absence of a signed confession from the arbitration judge they prefer to belittle plaintiffs.
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Well, the Kaiser, Epic, and Citrix PR teams all had their chance at the big spin last week, but ComputerWorld is unimpressed. This rung true for me more than any other comment I've seen on the EMR fiasco:
People in the field are frustrated, and the people in IT are just as frustrated because this was a solution forced upon us and was not an IT solution...
It looks like health care purchasers are finally starting to ask the right questions, too.
Today I'm also going to start a new series called KP LAWYER WATCH. The idea is to shine a light on how Kaiser lawyers game the legal system and how judges treat Kaiser cases. My hope is that other people who are involved in legal tangles with Kaiser will get some insight into their tricks (which have long been hidden by confidentiality agreements) and have a better chance at getting justice.
The first is a case of wrongful termination. The plaintiff was a social worker at Kaiser, and she was first harassed and then fired for reporting, on the advice of her union representative, a patient privacy violation that could be attributed to her manager. The plaintiff sued for retaliation and wrongful termination, took the case to trial, and the jury found in her favor. In 2003, the jury awarded the plaintiff both economic damages (including lost compensation) and compensation for emotional distress.
[The plaintiff had been]...raising patient care issues regarding mishandling and loss of patients charts, medical records, including orders[,] failure to provide equipment and supplies to the patient timely, breach of patient confidentiality, alteration of patient records. The jury also found [the plaintiff] had proven, by clear and convincing evidence that...[her manager] had acted with malice, fraud or oppression.
However, when the plaintiff asked for attorney fees and costs, Kaiser was determined to make her pay for the costs for resisting their retaliation. Kaiser convinced the court to deny the award of costs (apparently on some technicality relating to the fact the plaintiff had a new lawyer), and then Kaiser proceeded to appeal the whole judgment. So the plaintiff has had to pay for the new lawyer and pay for yet more court costs knowing that she's not even going to be reimbursed for the original trial.
Here is Kaiser's argument for the appeal:
[Kaiser contended that]...[the plaintiff] had failed to prove her common law cause of action because [the plaintiff] had failed to articulate the constitutional, statutory, or regulatory basis for the cause of action and failed to provide a nexus between the termination and Kaiser’s violation of any constitutional, statutory, or regulatory provision. Labor Code section 1102.5, the whistleblower protection statute, precludes employers from retaliating against an employee who communicates with governmental or law enforcement agencies where the employee has reasonable cause to believe that the information discloses a violation of state or federal statute, or a violation or noncompliance with a state or federal rule or regulation."
In other words, Kaiser thinks it's okay to retaliate as long as the plaintiff went to Kaiser's internal authorities instead of federal or law enforcement agencies. Current Kaiser employees take note - go to the feds first if you want to make sure you'll be treated like a whistleblower!
Here's how the judges ruled on the attorney fees and costs:
During the hearing on [the plaintiff]’s motion for attorney fees and costs, the trial court stated it did not “think . . . that the primary purpose of bringing this case was to benefit the public, it was for [the plaintiff] to get damages and/or get some kind of compensation for what happened to her.”
As the trial court found, the jury verdict in favor of [the plaintiff] did not confer a significant benefit upon the general public. Rather, it was a suit primarily brought to compensate [the plaintiff] for her losses, including lost wages. (See e.g., Flannery v. California Highway Patrol, supra, 61 Cal.App.4th at p. 635 [fees under section 1021.5 rejected because plaintiff’s primary purpose was vindication of her own personal right and economic interest]; Weeks v. Baker & McKenzie (1998) 63 Cal.App.4th 1128, 1170-1171 [sexual harassment case brought to vindicate plaintiff’s personal rights and economic interests]; compare with Edgerton v. State Personnel Bd. (2000) 83 Cal.App.4th 1350, 1362 [action helped preserve a significant public benefit].) Thus, the trial court did not abuse its discretion in denying the motion for attorney fees pursuant to Code of Civil Procedure section 1021.5.
...Health and Safety Code section 1432 prohibited long-term health care facilities from discriminating or retaliating against patients or employees of those facilities who complained or cooperated with governmental agencies relating to the case, services, or conditions at these facilities. Neither the current version of Health and Safety Code section 1432, nor the version in effect in 1999 had an attorney fee provision.
...Pursuant to Section 1278.5..."An employee who has been discriminated against in employment pursuant to this section shall be entitled to reinstatement, reimbursement for lost wages and work benefits caused by the acts of the employer, and the legal costs associated with pursuing the case."
...In her initial complaint and in her subsequently filed amended complaint [the plaintiff] did not include a cause of action based upon Section 1278.5, a statute specifically designed to expand the protections provided by other statutes (Note: Section 1278.5 was enacted in 1999, and became effective January 1, 2000 ~ CorpHQ). [The plaintiff] only sued on a common law cause of action for wrongful termination in violation of public policy and as to that cause of action, [the plaintiff] did not seek attorney fees. It does not appear that [the plaintiff] ever sought to add a statutory cause of action for wrongful termination. It does not appear that [the plaintiff] sought to amend her complaint to request attorney fees with regard to her common law wrongful termination cause of action. As we discussed in Case No. B167858, [the plaintiff] tethered her common law cause of action to Labor Code section 1102.5, and possibly to Title 22. Even though her complaint was filed seven months after the effective date of Section 1278.5, [the plaintiff] never suggested Kaiser violated Section 1278.5, or that her wrongful discharge cause of action was tethered to this Health and Safety Code section. [the plaintiff] raised Section 1278.5 only after trial, in her motion for attorney fees and costs.
Thus, [the plaintiff] never pursued a statutory cause of action for wrongful termination. [the plaintiff] did not pursue her wrongful termination case pursuant to Section 1278.5. (§ 1278.5, subd. (g) [stating that employee who was “discriminated against in employment pursuant to this section shall be entitled to...the legal costs associated with pursuing the case”]; cf. U. S. v. Stone Container Corp. (9th Cir. 1999) 196 F.3d 1066, 1068-1069 [party seeking attorney fees under particular statute must have brought claim “pursuant to” that statute, as the statute specified].) Rather, [the plaintiff] rested her wrongful discharge cause of action solely upon a common law cause of action in which she did not seek attorney fees. Having prevailed on that common law cause of action, [the plaintiff] is foreclosed from belatedly arguing (after a verdict is rendered) that she is entitled to attorney fees and costs based upon a statutory claim.
For reasons unbeknown to this court, [the plaintiff] never put before the jury the suggestion that Kaiser’s actions violated Section 1278.5, even though the statute was enacted prior to the complaint being filed and even though such an argument would parallel many of her Title 22 and Labor Code section 1102.5 arguments. We will not second guess this tactical decision. [the plaintiff] did not raise a statutory cause of action for wrongful termination. Thus, she cannot seek statutory remedies under that statute.
In light of our conclusion, we need not address [the plaintiff]’s argument that a retroactive application of subdivision (g) of Section 1278.5 enables her to obtain attorney fees and costs. For this proposition, [the plaintiff] cites to a number of cases including, Bradley v. Richmond School Board (1974) 416 U.S. 696, California Housing Finance Agency v. E.R. Fairway Associates I (1995) 37 Cal.App.4th 1508, Harbor View Hills Community Assn. v. Torley (1992) 5 Cal.App.4th 343, Kievlan v. Dahlberg Electronics, Inc. (1978) 78 Cal.App.3d 951, and Olson v. Hickman (1972) 25 Cal.App.3d 920. These cases and their discussion do not address the facts before us.
Thus, the trial court did not err in denying [the plaintiff]’s request for attorney fees and costs pursuant to Section 1278.5.
DISPOSITION
The order denying attorney fees and costs is affirmed. [The plaintiff] is to pay costs on appeal.
Am I the only one UTTERLY DISGUSTED with the way the court system works?
A couple of weenie judges have decided to ignore the jury's clear intent to sanction Kaiser for retaliation in favor of blaming the plaintiff for not bringing up a new statute during the original trial.
So it's clear that the courts have thrown their weight behind the idea that the victims of retaliation have to pay for justice. That's unconscionable. Note that it's now been seven years since the plaintiff lost her job, and legal costs will doubtlessly eat away the plaintiff's original award. And that's Kaiser's plan: to make sure that no one really gets compensated for retaliation, and to send a message that victims will have to pay and pay and pay for years and years and years to pursue the complaint.
More Kaiser lawsuit strategy and chicanery to come!
Disclaimer: Lawsuit documents have not been obtained from any party to the action - all documents have been obtained from the public domain.
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Linda Rosencrance's new ComputerWorld article drills down into the details of Kaiser's EMR woes. Will post more about this in a few minutes.
And much later... HISTalk just posted his terrific interview with Justen Deal.
Oh my: Kaiser smackdown.
Ouch...my head hurts from trying to figure out what I should post here. Most of today's stuff...probably not. :-(
While I'm pondering, here's more Sexy Second Life Avatar in Kaiser Thieves Shirt pics. I haven't named her yet - suggestions welcome.
 
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Hi, all - I'm at a "Web 2.2" meetup, and I'm having a lot of trouble with the wireless connection. Therefore, I apologize for any delay in moderating comments.
In the meantime Pound of Cure found another interview with Justen. I'm going to copy my whole comment here:
Wow, that looks like a mug shot of Justen! I'd like to point out that as the "anti-Kaiser web site" that broke the story, I refrained from posting Justen's email. I still haven't posted it. Because of my own experience, I knew what he was in for, and I didn't want to add to what he was going to go through.
As for the issue of "keeping it internal", though, Justen did set up fixkp.org as a public web site. He intended to take the problem public. But Justen is probably going through a lot of turmoil right now with all sorts of people who don't know him commenting about his motives. I tried to warn him that he wouldn't be treated well by Bay Area press. Hopefully this story will be covered by media venues that have less of a stake in Kaiser as a backbone of the Bay Area economy that employees friends, family, and career influence-brokers.
Also, Matthew Holt of The Health Care blog still thinks the bloodletting has nothing to do with the EMR. However, he does think Cliff "Changed-My-Name-to-John" Dodd may have made a wee faux pas by not disclosing the million dollar conflict of interest caused by his Board gig at Tanning.
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Two days ago I wrote about Nick Moretta's struggle to get someone, anyone, to address attempted cover-up of a medical error at Kaiser. Moretta had already been coping with the life-changing consequences of a previous suspicious incident at Kaiser that left his wife permanently brain damaged.
Now Kaiser has retaliated with trumped up charges of "threatening behavior" to deprive the Morettas of their remaining health coverage.
While "threatening" behavior might actually be seen as a reasonable response at a blatant attempt to cover up a medical error Moretta witnessed - God knows Kaiser's persistant practice of falsifying documentation to superimpose the scenario most convenient to them at the expense of relatively helpless victims INFURIATES me - the letter sent to Moretta must be seen in the context of Kaiser's standard method of managing risk through retaliation. Kaiser managers are coached by HR on how to tell stories that will pass compliance scrutiny, essentially inviting managers to game the system. If a Kaiser manager wants to fire an employee, they "build a file" with false documentation. All a manager has to do is goad an employee into making a complaint, and then that employee is "threatening." If Kaiser wants to fire a patient, they do the same thing. Moretta has made a complaint, so now he's "threatening." The fact Kaiser's medical error and cover-up provoked that complaint is immaterial.
Moretta, in fact, has explained that Kaiser is twisting an offhand joke - this is a tactic I've seen personally seen used in multiple instances by Kaiser lawyers. Hopefully any media, lawyers, or regulatory agencies that look into this will not only call Kaiser to account for egregious retaliation, they will put this into the context of the larger injustice to the Morettas - that Kaiser has already avoided responsibility for the horrific harm inflicted on Debi Moretta.
Update: Here's the latest Kaiser employee retaliation lawsuit that details some of Kaiser's trumped up documentation techniques referenced above. One possible incentive for Kaiser to always give false documentation the first shot is that the punishment for fraud meted out by state and federal agencies is incomprehensibly light.
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Looks like Kaiser got knocked over by a feather again. Keep in mind Kaiser has been seeking to dramatically reduce their $250 million/year investment in technology staff. With that level of investment, it seems like Kaiser could have sent one of these superfluous contractors to install Norton on the call center machines (and perhaps deploy some security guards as well). Then again, since spinmeister Schiffgens is involved, maybe the "virus" isn't the real story at all...
Arch Kaiser Kriminal Henry Mead Kaiser was sentenced to a paltry year in prison. Is anyone ready to talk about the judicial corruption in California yet?
Looks like Kaiser marketing is on a racial profiling kick again. Kaiser's use of racial profiling tactics to create new markets is an ongoing problem.
Also, looks like Kaiser paid big to avert a nurses strike.
Update on the Pellini story: According to people close to the Pellini case...
Kaiser and Kaiser's Attorney and Arbitrator refuse to put in writing the agreement that they made with CBS 5 to extend the statute of limitations and that Teresa Pellini may represent her father if she so chooses. Because Kaiser, their attorney and the arbitrator refuse to confirm their agreement with CBS 5 in writing they are only pretending to make a deal and there really is not one.
They appear to have only made a verbal agreement with the Pellini family and CBS 5 for show and nothing more.
Update 2: Kaiserpapers has posted the picture of Mr. Pellini's Kaiser-inflicted injuries.
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Kaiser's chief tactic has always been to deny victims advocacy so they can just overpower anyone who gets in their way. Tonight (Friday, September 1) at 6pm, members of the public in the San Francisco Bay Area can see one of Kaiser's sleazy tactics in action in a report by the local CBS News (KPIX channel 5). The story will follow Kaiser's attempt to throw Teresa Pellini in jail for "practicing law without a license" while representing her elderly father in Arbitration (the issue is abuse and incompetence by Kaiser staff).
After the Pellini family tried for many months to get a lawyer, the only option they had left was to try to represent themselves. Kaiser should have been satisfied that the Pellini family would be severely disadvantaged going up against Kaiser's team of high-powered lawyers. But no - they want to make sure that Teresa's father has no to stand up for him at all.
Update: Report on the Pellini interview now available online here.
I mentioned in an earlier post that I've been trying to help another woman who was "de-lawyered" and subsequently harassed by Kaiser. I know for a fact she's been trying frantically to get representation for several months, since I'm one of the people she's been reaching out to. If there's a lawyer who wants to stand up for victim's rights in general and let Kaiser know how shameful it is for the big bully to deprive people they've already victimized of adequate representation, then please let me know. Frankly, this situation cries out for a class action.
Kaiser's dispute resolution process denies subordinate employees legal representation while only offering HR counseling and advocacy to managers. Since Kaiser's dispute resolution process takes many months, employees who agree to this phony mediation lose the chance to file a lawsuit and give Kaiser time to destroy evidence and promote "fading memories" before a complaint can be filed with a government oversight agency.
If our political representatives really want to do something about Kaiser corruption, perhaps they should try addressing the means Kaiser is using to get away with both employee and patient abuse. Kaiser has unlimited resources: victims need to be guaranteed the right to an advocate at the very least.
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For those interested in Kaiser's hit-and-run approach to malpractice, Nick Moretta has long been dealing with the horrific consequences of a Kaiser medical error (check out the record of the doctor involved). I'm posting a link here to online copies of the letters Nick recently wrote about further malpractice, attempted cover-ups, and falsified documentation. Kaiser will keep on resorting to falsifying documentation as long as they can get away with it. This is another problem that will also only be solved by strong legislative and legal action to introduce disincentives and sanctions to inhibit Kaiser's habitual use of false documentation.
It would be great if a grand jury could gather evidence from all the cases that have been quietly settled or blocked via Kaiser's strip-the-victim-of-defense strategy mentioned above.
Update: And here's yet another story of patient abuse at Kaiser.
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Kaiser helped a child molester get his sentence cut in half by giving a child's medical information to the convict's sister over the phone. Kaiser's bid for self-exhoneration is that their phone representative "followed procedure", and the blame lies with whoever shared the child's medical record number and "password".
I personally very much doubt a password was involved. If the malefactors had the password, they could have obtained the information they wanted from Kaiser Online, without going through the risk and trouble of persuading a Kaiser employee to help them. As for MRNs - I think it's a bit mean-spirited to imply the only problem is the victim sharing their MRN with random strangers, when hundreds of thousands of Kaiser MRNs have been found on stolen laptops, on Kaiser magazine mailing labels, in the pockets of rogue temps, via Kaiser web site and email glitches, in random boxes at Office Depot, and, of course, posted for years on the Internet as part of the Systems Diagrams. And then there are scams, scams, and more scams. Given that Kaiser has so many leaks around the edges - which include outsourcing transcription to India (by using contracting firms that outsource to India) and exposing their Colorado Intranet for the whole world to see for goodness knows how long - how dare they even suggest that the ease with which a criminal obtained a child's medical records over the phone is a matter of the victim's responsibility in guarding their MRN?
Kaiser simply shouldn't be giving personal medical information out over the phone. There's just no way to verify who they are giving it to. The "unique" MRN has been proven to be an extremely low barrier - because Kaiser itself sprays this sort of data everywhere. It's time to stop allowing Kaiser to shift the blame for this problem (blaming the victim, attempting to frame the whistleblower, etc.) and start facing the reality that even organizations with the immense resources of Kaiser can't be trusted to protect our medical information. Perhaps there should be an independent service that keeps these records in the equivalent of a bank vault: that would not only be safer - it would make it easier for people to switch health care providers at the drop of a hat, too.
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First, congratulations to Dr. Charles Phillips for speaking out about the Kaiser "pittance" fine. Also, it looks like Kaiser has found a way to discourage patients from requesting Accutane.
I'm actually itching to share some juicy info I have on who Kaiser plans to shaft next - but I want to check it out with a few people first. In the meantime, here's a press release about an employee's dispute with Kaiser - including an accusation of GLBT price discrimination!
PRESS RELEASE
08/20/06
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CHARGES OF EMPLOYMENT PRACTICE DISCRIMINATION AND RETALIATION FILED WITH EEOC AGAINST KAISER PERMANENTE HEALTH PLAN.
Denver, CO - John L. Johnson has been a Gay and Lesbian activist, as well as an activist for the rights of Latinos and Persons of Color for over 20 years. He was a strong voice opposing Amendment 2 in Colorado, which would have legalized discrimination in housing and employment based on sexual orientation. His membership in La Gente Politica later to be renamed La Gente Unida, and support of Brown Pride made him a recognized face in the Denver and National Equal Rights arena and earned him a place in the Denver Police Department's "spy files", later to be found in 2002 not to have been involved in illegal activity. These very qualities of activism and his contacts in the Gay and Latino communities were attractive enough to Kaiser Permanente for the corporation to recruit and use John as an example of diversity for their outreach into these target markets for new members. He has been consulted to address the needs of the Gay/Lesbian and Latino communities within Kaiser Permanenete and a longstanding Co-Chair of Kaiser Permanente's Gay/Lesbian/Bisexual/Transgender(GLBT) Staff Association in Colorado. His work providing information to Human Rights Campaign (HRC) helped Kaiser Permanente rate 100 on the HRC Corporate Equality Index in 2005.
In November of 2004, John L. Johnson,who started working in 1978 with Kaiser Foundation Health Plan dba Kaiser Permanente in Colorado, began bidding on positions in the Kaiser Permanente Hawaii Region. His plans were to transfer his years of service and eventually retire in 15-17 years with Kaiser Permanente. In the 21 months that have followed his first attempt to transfer to Hawaii, John has gone from an award-winning employee with what he thought were his allies in the fight for equality and fair treatment in the Latino and GLBT community, to a pariah. He has inadvertently exposed hiring and management practices ranging from discrimination, records tampering, electronic sabotage,and systemic retaliation towards an employee who asked questions that corporate and regional management did not want to answer.
On April 28th, 2006, a Charge Of Discrimination was recorded with the Hawaii Civil Rights Commission(HCRC) and the United States Equal Employment Opportunities Commission (EEOC) in Honolulu based on Race and Sexual Orientation. By the date the charges were filed John L. Johnson had bid over 62 times on positions, none of which were ever offered to him, with strong evidence that his bids, resume' and letters of reference were never made available for consideration to responsible parties for these positions. According to John, when asking if the difficulty he was having was due to him being Mexican or gay, the recruiter in Hawaii told him “I know how it is, I had 'people like you' when I owned a tacqueria in Atlanta”. John had been a well-respected Dispensing Optician for over 12 years when this statement was made to him.
In the course of trying to find out why he was having so much difficulty with his attempt at transferring and why he was not getting answers to his questions he discovered a few facts. One fact of interest is because John is Co-Chair for the Kaiser Permanente GLBT Staff Association, his union representative asked if he was aware that Kaiser Permanente's much celebrated domestic partner health benefits were substantially higher premiums compared to his married counterparts, e.g. John pays over $370 a month for coverage for his partner while married employees have had up to 5 dependents covered for under $185 per month.
Only GLBT employees seem to be paying this bloated rate, basically a “gay tax”, and with Kaiser Permanente courting GLBT employees to show their diversity, a very profitable tax it is. When this was mentioned to other regions of Kaiser Permanente it became a point addressed in a national diversity conference Kaiser Permanente held in Northern California early 2006. John was unable to attend. Since John filed his complaint with HCRC and the EEOC in Hawaii, 2 Retaliation Complaints were filed with the EEOC office in Denver, June 30th and August 7th 2006. He has been removed from the position as a Dispensing Optician and facility location and reassigned to a warehouse doing assembly work while having to drive daily an additional 30 minutes each direction. The reason given were his skills were in question after 12 years in the same job. During his forced transfer, management constantly avoided any request to meet with him face to face. He was told he would be trained for a “skills assessment” and reinstated to his position. After the equivalent of 5 working days of training from April 14th to July 25th (standard training is 8-12 months) with some sessions as short as 15 minutes and with constant interruptions, the trainer deemed John unable to pass the skills assessment on July 25th, 2006. On July 27th, 2006 he was removed from his position as an Optical Dispenser permanently and given until August 31st, 2006 to find other employment within Kaiser Permanente or he will be terminated. With said termination he will lose his retirement benefits and health coverage for later in his life after 27 years of service and fully qualifying (vested)for these benefits according to policy.
On August 17th, 2006 John met for EEOC mediation at Kaiser Permanente's request. Kaiser Permanente had 8 representatives appear, a number the mediator said she had never seen in over 14 years of mediation, and John appeared alone. A decision was made by John, after a weak offer by Kaiser Permanente to drop the Complaint of Retaliation, to pursue the case to the full and legal conclusion in a court of law. The memories of growing up in Southern Colorado, of seeing signs warning of No Dogs or Mexicans are very strong in John's mind. He said he became soft, he thought being trotted out by Kaiser Permanente as evidence of diversity and positive advancements in workplace civil rights would come into play when he asked for the same fair and equal treatment. While courting different groups, it seems Kaiser Permanente feels hard work by all does not mean same policies and equal treatment for all. John now says the fire of activism has been relit, and the soldier within has awoken.
Interview Contact: John L. Johnson
Telephone: 303-484-8810
john_johnsonkpco (at) yahoo.com
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I agree that the Kaiser fine is a pittance - but who wrote this article? I'd be honestly surprised if it's the position statement of the the Contra Costa Times...
The back channels of the Kaiser patient advocacy world are abuzz today because no one believes the CA Department of Managed Health Care's repeated claims that the first complaints they received about Kaiser's transplant fiasco were in March. If someone reading my LiveJournal filed a complaint about Kaiser's kidney transplant program with the DMHC before March, 2006, please let me know, and I'll see what I can do to hook you up with some recourse.
LOL - because of the doctor's name, this powerpoint presentation popped into my inbox under the name Kaiser-crooks.
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The CA Dept. of Managed Health Care is now investigating whether other Kaiser complaints have been swept under the rug.
This is hilarious. When those complaints were swept under the rug, the victims went to the DMHC. The DMHC then swept them under the rug! Everyone who has ever tried to file a complaint with the DMHC knows they reject your initial complaint automatically and make you play phone tag with a long distance number until you're worn down and give up. And my case showed the DMHC is just as quick to cover their ass as Kaiser when they make a mistake - to the extent of breaking a legal settlement if they believe their victim doesn't have a lawyer or political influence. What a bunch of hypocrites.
But if the DMHC is actually conducting an investigation of Kaiser, I hope the first thing they notice is that Kaiser is ALL TALK! While they are “reflecting” on their wholehearted support for the jackasses who are perpetuating the abuse and fraud, they have done NOTHING to reach out to the people they have harmed. NOTHING to repair what they’ve done. They’re just waiting for the media moment to pass so they can sweep it under the rug.
Meanwhile Kaiser is reinvesting millions of dollars in profits in venture capital schemes. Yes, Kaiser membership fees and medical bills are funding already rich and powerful doctors so they can play get-rich-quick games. This is the reason that the public needs to get past all of Kaiser's "not-for-profit" rhetoric and realize the medical groups are for profit. And that profit is being used for investments to personally benefit those doctors, not for the cause of public health.
Coming soon: the story of a woman who was bullied by Kaiser lawyers into appearing for a deposition the minute she was without legal representation. In addition to the stress of her attempt to find a lawyer at the last minute, she was in a car accident. The lawyer continued to send her threatening emails, implying she would have to pay his costs and instantly lose the case if she didn't appear without representation. What I'd like to do is publish the details of what he actually put her through during the deposition (yes, she ended up going alone) - but I'm still trying to figure out how I can do this without giving the Kaiser lawyer additional ammunition.
If anyone has a story of dirty tricks and misconduct by a Kaiser lawyer, please send me your story. I won't automatically post it on my blog (unless you want me to). What I'd like to do is use this as a research base so I can establish patterns in the behavior of Kaiser's lawyers and perhaps present this as a general issue to the Bar Association. The Bar Association blows off people with individual complaints, but they might pay attention to a petition.
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The only reason Kaiser has been getting away with the crap it gets away with is that the government, the media, and everyone else who could have put them under review chose to look the other way. The stars of justice must have finally aligned, though. As much as Kaiser's PR department scrambles to stuff the news channels with fluff articles, the serious journalists aren't being thrown off the trail.
First, the president of Kaiser Northwest resigned because first quarter profits dropped 88% - largely because of glitches with the EMR (Electronic Medical Record) billing system. The EMR, which was subsidized by hikes in member fees (including millions of dollars wasted on the write off of the previous system) was chosen expressly for the billing system. Kaiser rushed out the billing system first thing, and they probably would have been satisfied with just installing that. This is a failure of awe-inspiring proportions, and it should give people pause for thought before Kaiser manages to pawn it off on the Federal government as the Medicare EMR. Yep - the ultimate plan was for the taxpayer to foot the bill and line the pockets of Kaiser's "early EMR adopter" shareholders.
How interesting to learn from the same article that Kaiser suffered a 112% loss in underwriting (profit from insurance sales). Looks like consumers are finally starting to wise up. Perhaps one too many Kaiser doctors dismissed imminent heart failure as a "recommendation for diet and exercise". I've been told that Kaiser lowers its metrics for heart attacks by not counting anyone who dies before they reach the emergency room.
But that's not all! There's more revelations from the David Merlin lawsuit. Finally, investigative journalists are paying attention to the role played by Kaiser's profit-taking medical groups:
So far, however, no senior executives in the Permanente Medical Group, which ran the unit, have left or been reprimanded. And except for the first days after the issue came to light, TPMG executives have repeatedly deflected questions on the medical group’s role, leaving Mary Ann Thode, president of Kaiser’s Northern California hospital and health-plan units, to bear the brunt of public scrutiny....The medical group, unlike the rest of Kaiser, is a for-profit enterprise that splits profits among its physician partners. Critics say that gives an incentive for the group to bring services in-house for financial reasons, sometimes to the detriment of enrollees. In addition, critics say, Kaiser’s emphasis on “population health” — meaning providing cost-effective care for the greatest number of enrollees — carries within it some risk that the interests of individual patients could be compromised in an attempt to stretch health-care dollars across a broad spectrum of care.
That appears to have been one of the factors leading Kaiser executives to take steps that put some individual patients at risk, with the goal of ultimately benefiting the greater good, Given said. This “may at least partially explain TPMG’s unwillingness to respond to (patient and family) complaints in a timely manner — or apparently at all — if the media had not gotten involved.” ....Other sources, including some within Kaiser, say Kaiser’s corporate culture and the influence of its powerful medical group, contributed to a reluctance to address these issues directly and publicly....Critics say the powerful influence of Kaiser’s doctors within the organization is little known to the public or to regulators, and that financial incentives sometimes result in clinical decisions that can put some patients in jeopardy. A senior Kaiser source blamed the situation on internal power struggles and cultural change within what the source called “a doctor’s culture.”
Other highlights of this article include the whistleblower Merlin being told to "shut up", and Kaiser's notorious "issues management" consultant, making the snide comment: "we’re not to going to litigate or advance our litigation strategy in the media."
This remark has particular resonance for me this week because I've been talking to several people about the tactics Kaiser's lawyers use when judges were out of sight. I was personally threatened on two occasions by a Kaiser lawyer who said, and this is a quote, patients wanted to "come after me", and I would thus have to cooperate with Kaiser if I wanted them to protect me. Of course the only reason patients might want to "come after me" is that Kaiser called up 150+ patients to tell them that I had stolen their patient info when Kaiser itself had been posting the info on the Internet for around five years. It's my belief that Kaiser has only been able to get away with this sort of unethical bullying because people who are involved with lawsuits are all isolated. If there's anyone with access to Lexis-Nexis and an interest in legal research (Ph.D. student, perhaps?) who might be interested in researching patterns in the "hallway" part of Kaiser's "litigation strategy", please let me know.
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Last, but certainly not least, Kaiser has been posting patient info on the Internet yet again. The patient involved received this letter in March 2006, but the letter itself is undated. My theory is that Kaiser did this deliberately to create confusion if this letter was used in litigation. I haven't seen a word about this letter from either the press or the DMHC (remember the DMHC making a big deal about how they wanted to handle HIPAA violations even though all of Kaiser's training materials says to report violations to the Federal Dept. of Health and Human Services...?).
This is a stunning HIPAA violation. Remember Kaiser siccing their full lawyer power (as well the DMHC) on me just for calling attention to their publicly posted web site? (Note the EFF finally figured out the problem with persecuting the transmitter of public posted information in this case). So how on earth did Kaiser manage to quash it?
I challenge investigative journalists to follow up on and validate this letter. While I've redacted the patient's name on the document I posted, I'm sure the patient would be more than willing to cooperate.
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If you've ever needed to get an x-ray at Kaiser, you might want to take another look at the standard of care you received. Kaiser Thrive has posted a the story of a student that faced extreme retaliation when he or she pointed out that the law required that their work be supervised by a qualified medical professional. Who wants to bet that the bozo managers mentioned in the letter are still enjoying Kaiser's largesse while the student was booted out the door?
Kaiser's HR practice of covering up for bad managers is a CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY. This is not hyperbole. Lives are at stake. Keep an eye on David Merlin's lawsuit against Kaiser for ongoing revelations about how...
* Kaiser never attempted to reconcile its end-stage kidney patient records with those at its former contracting hospitals.
* Hundreds of patient charts were lost.
* "Perfect match" kidneys were refused "when patients could and should have received them."
* Kaiser nurses gave out "inaccurate and false information" about the medical status of patients and their care.
* Patients were being given inappropriate medications.
* Surgical and medical decision-making processes were confused.
* Unspecified abuses occurred in the physician review process.
Would a few of the deceased kidney patients be alive today if Merlin hadn't faced the utter turpitude and unethical behavior of Kaiser's "old school" management? Of course if Merlin had just shrugged off the patients and declared his enthusiasm for duck hunting and fine wine, he would have fit right in.
Ps. I've got two unbelievable Kaiser stories still in my pocket. ;-)
PPs. Looks like Kaiser is being investigated for illegally dumping patients off their insurance when the going gets rough.
PPPs. If anyone wants to dish about the bad bosses at Kaiser, you could win a vacation! I've already given them the lowdown on Kaiser's Technology Group. Actually, I could probably get ten or twenty prize-winning bad boss stories out of that experience...
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Edward Wynne, an employment lawyer, contacted me because he's working on an investigation for a Kaiser's wage and hour class action. It would would help him a great deal if Kaiser employees who are aware of labor law violations give him a ring. His contact information is below:
Edward J. Wynne LLP
Wynne Law Firm
100 Drakes Landing Road, Ste. 275
Greenbrae, CA 94904
Tel. 415-461-6400
Fax. 415-461-3900
Toll fee. 1-877-352-6400
www.wynnelawfirm.com
(Ps. Mr. Wynne tells me his law firm takes all sorts of employment cases, so it might be worth checking out even if you aren't an hourly employee.)
I just found out about a stunning Kaiser cover up, and I'm hoping I will be able to post something about it soon.
Here's some of the news that's hit my inbox since the last time I posted:
Kaiser is now busy screwing over veterans (also see this story) and leaving stranded patients in the lurch.
Local doctors are fretting about the Kaiser monopoly, while Britain just narrowly missed being Kaiserized.
I found an old article that makes an interesting observation about medical ethics at Kaiser.
Kaiser Thrive reports that Kaiser has done some corporate re-alignment in San Francisco. Who wants to bet that Kaiser will argue that the change of personnel addresses the issue of inflicting early death on the Kidney transplant victims.
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In my previous post about the Kaiser criminal underground (overground? superground?), I left out Henry Mead Kaiser, a scion of the Kaiser dynasty who was on the Board of Directors for both the Kaiser health plan and Kaiser hospitals. In 2004, Henry Kaiser pleaded guilty of fraud in the SureWest scam. If massive fraud is his idea of "business as usual", imagine how he was "directing" Kaiser.
Dr. Takesugi has been fired. The sex and weapons charges are stacking up.
Kaiser Thrive reports that the attorneys who represented Dr. Mark Woods in a successful retaliation case against Kaiser have now taken up the claims of several Kaiser patient advocates.
Bernard Burks, a victim of the Kaiser's transplant debacle, has filed a lawsuit.
Patients should be on the lookout for Kaiser letters soliciting their DNA: this is not just about Kaiser using people for their research, it's about Kaiser owning and packaging their results as part of their Population Management data so they can resell their Electronic Medical Record (EMR) system.
Update: I found this comment on an older post, and I thought it should be promoted to the front page (bolding added by me):
I have been a Kaiser employee for over 21 years. No until recently had I started having problems with management. One occurance was that I was going to be written up for already approved vacation time, since this happended to be on a Friday, it was deemed a pattern. I had been off two weeks earlier on a Friday, which was also approved by my manager. This so called pattern, according to my Union rep, applies only with call-offs of emergency time off. When I brought this to my manager's attention, the retalition started. I was disciplined for not initializing work, and such. I went through the usual route, Union, Employee Assistance, who informed me that retaliation was inevitable, and Administration. I got yawns, and was told to keep my whining down to a minimum. After all there are a thousand people who would love to have your job. And did you know that they would be able to get two people for the price they pay me. Loyalty is a liability. You have two ways to survive in the organization, either kiss but and tattle on others to gain the favor of your manager, or pray to god every day that someone else is in the dog house. Class action suit sounds fantastic. But without a group of people with the same consencus, where does one go. And what law firm would take on the Kaiser giant. Only time will tell. Good luck to all.
Entirely typical. It's way past time to shape up, Kaiser.
Update: Yesterday Kaiser Thrive pointed out that the federal Medicare and Medicaid inspectors have issued a report that condemns Kaiser's shady practices. Note once again the problem is that Kaiser's first reaction is always to lie, and then they just whine and squirm and cast about for scapegoats when they get caught. They shouldn't be playing this sort of "risk management" PR game when there are human lives at stake.
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Complaints about Dr. Takasugi's "sexual exploitation" of patients go back five years. This case reminds me of something else I've been meaning to bring up here. While I didn't see doctors passing around sexually explicit pictures at Kaiser, they did pass around pictures of "interesting" medical conditions. I was in the room while a group of doctors were gawking at a patient's horrible leg condition. This wasn't a consult - the picture was being passed around because it was "weird". This is the sort of "HIPAA violation" that Kaiser patients should be worried about.
While the public is somewhat aware of Dr. Death Patel, there have been other criminals running around in the Kaiser system. Kaiser doctors and staff have been involved in date rape, sexual assault, sexual battery, intent to seduce a child (registered as a sex offender), setting up a man for false imprisonment to cover up Kaiser mistakes, and recruiting children for prostitution, child molestation. There was also a charge of attempted rape made in a comment on this blog. This is my off-hand list, so I'm sure a little research would turn up more.
At minimum this is a call to Kaiser members to not just accept "any doctor" with an open panel. If you get a creepy doctor, demand to see someone else.
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I just found this remark about ex-Kaiser bigwig Dick Pettingill buried in my comments:
Yes, Dick Pettingill has moved on to Minnesota where he has tried to implement the EPIC Systems EMR. What a joke! The EMR is a disaster at my hospital. The system is so cumbersome most of the docs are refusing to take part in the whole CPOE idea. Trying to run a hospital using big business efficiency models just simply doesn't work. Now, because we're going broke trying to pay for the EMR, he's making staffing cuts and trying to squeeze the worker-bees in order to try to stay afloat. thanks Kaiser for sending him our way!!
And here was my reply:
The same thing happened at Kaiser. First they wrote off $442 million on an IBM system that was just incomprehensible. I have to say IBM is famous for this - they try to impose proprietary language and weird systems so corporations will have to rely on IBM consultants. In this case, the consultants would come in and start talking about "applying baselets", and all the physicians would just glaze over. To this day the number one problem with the technical point of view is that the user should take the time out of their regular job to learn new systems. :-p
Kaiser is paying for its current EMR by hiking their membership fees and passing the costs on to patients.
Original quote here.
In other news, one of the law firms suing Kaiser has weighed in on Kaiser's latest warning from Medicare:
"The findings just released by the federal Center for Medicare Services (CMS) appear to confirm what we believe and alleged in our lawsuit to be true. Kaiser was negligent in their failure to meet quality standards and in patient care. As a result, members' rights were severely compromised...The fact that Kaiser will NOT appeal the federal findings speaks volumes about their wrongful conduct. The failure of Kaiser's San Francisco Kidney Transplant Program and lack of oversight is inexcusable. However, Medicare must continue reimbursement for Kaiser kidney patients at UCSF and UC Davis or the patients will be victimized further...A June 15 deadline has been imposed on Kaiser to report their plan of correction to the federal agency. "It is outrageous that kidney transplants were delayed and Kaiser patients died or their health was adversely affected. We will anxiously await Kaiser's plan to correct their deficiencies..."
However, the plaintiffs will probably be victimized yet further by Kaiser's system of forced arbitration, which relies on freelance Judges who want to please Kaiser in order to get further business from them.
By the way, did anyone else notice that Kaiser whipped out spinmeister Schiffgens? What does it say that Kaiser is resorting to a proven liar, who has shown no remorse for attempting to frame me, as the frontman for the ongoing transplant debacle?
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Medicare warned that the agency may pull the plug on federal funding if Kaiser doesn't shape up in regard to the San Francisco kidney program - apparently the death-machine is still treating existing patients.
A few days ago, Kaiser was hit with a second wave of lawsuits over the bungled transplant program.
It appears that Kaiser was more concerned about the bottom line than the health of their member patients," said Larry Eisenberg, a partner at Eisenberg & Gray LLP.
Contact info for Eisenberg & Gray:
Eisenberg & Gray LLP, Irvine
Larry Eisenberg, 949-753-1500
leisenberg@eglawyers.com
Here's an analysis of Kaiser's last minute deal to avoid a pharmacist strike.
Just say no to Kaiser's request for DNA samples for 2 million people - this will be used to buff up Kaiser's proprietary "population management" data that they intend to bundle with their Electronic Medical Record (EMR)to resell to other health care organizations and the government. Though members paid fee-increases up front, they won't benefit from the profits of the resale. Also, there's the potential irony of Kaiser getting federal funding to build the EMR in the first place and then reselling back to government: taxpayers pay twice.
Best of all, a Washington Times article alludes to Kaiser posting patient info on the Internet in it's discussion of the failure of federal agencies to enforce HIPAA. My own case underscores the failure of the Department of Health and Human Services, which administers HIPAA through the Office of Civil Rights. The fact the OCR ignored my complaint for four months and then seemed to do nothing about it prompted me to blog on the problem. The OCR denied me whistleblower protection because my case was in "the press", even though Kaiser created the press by attempting to frame me (with identifying info provided by the OCR!). The OCR never responded to further inquiries sent to people it had given as "contacts". I know other people who have filed HIPAA complaints with the OCR *last year*, and their case hasn't been addressed yet.
And let's not forget that OCR officials hobnob with the bigwigs at the health care organizations they are supposed to regulate by accepting cushy conference invitations. And for all this incompetence and schmoozing, Bush promoted OCR director Richard Campanelli to "counselor of human policy". It's FEMA all over again.
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Kaiser has been found guilty of retaliating against a physician who dared to raise concerns about quality of care!
It's about friggin' time!
I hope the public will be swift to take notice of the parade of problems:
- filthy treatment rooms
- delays in care
- a patient found a urinal containing someone else's urine on a nightstand in his treatment room
- bloody instruments left in the sink of a treatment room and a shortage of nitroglycerin, epinephrine, resuscitation bags and other supplies
- doctors seeing bodily fluids from previous patients when examining current patient in the room
- Kaiser, rather than fixing the problems, tried to cover them up
And then there's Kaiser's mean-spirited habit, which I can personally vouch for, of discouraging employees from putting complaints in email form, saying they could be used in lawsuits. If I could have found a lawyer to represent me after I lost my job, the one thing I would have most wanted the judge and jury to tell Kaiser is intimidating their employees with threats and retaliation for simply putting a problem in writing is not just illegal, but morally unacceptable in a decent society. Kaiser can't continue to get away with firing people for putting problems in writing. This is why Kaiser's problems are so out of hand: who is left to fix the problems when everyone who dares to put problems in writing is fired?
Woods was not even on my list of Kaiser retaliation lawsuits. I don't have access to Lexis, or any other law search engine, so please let me know about similar cases I should add to the list.
And the Judge ruled that Kaiser's attempts to force arbitration were "unconscionable" and unenforceable! Woo-double-hoo!
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