Dangerous Doctors

According to an article published in USA Today, the nation’s state medical boards continue to allow thousands of physicians to keep practicing medicine after findings of serious misconduct that can put patients at risk. 

Many doctors have been banded by hospitals and other medical facilities, but their medical licenses remain intact.

Research shows that even the worst misconduct goes unpunished; nearly 250 doctors were cited as an “immediate threat to health and safety,” but their licenses were never taken away.

By law, hospitals and other health care institutions are required to report to the National Practitioner Data Bank when doctors lose clinical privileges in connection with investigations of substandard care or misconduct. At the beginning of 2011, however, 47 percent of hospitals had never reported restricting or revoking a doctor’s clinical privileges.

Even though many doctors have had their medicine practicing privileges taken away, their state medical boards have unfortunately taken no action against their licenses to practice, allowing more patients to be put in danger.