NEWS STORY Jan 21, 2010
On Tuesday, a federal court in Virginia sentenced a 27-year-old nurse to two years in prison for multiple counts of identity theft.
Erica Fowler had pled guilty to stealing the identities of nine patients in 2008 from Our Lady of Perpetual Help, an assisted living home specializing in Alzheimer’s and dementia care.
It was only after one month of working at the home that Erica began to apply for credit cards using stolen identities. She then racked up $14,000 in credit card charges, including buying furniture.
Of course, the victims were none the wiser since they suffered from Alzheimer’s or some form of dementia. In the end, it took a patient’s relative to discover the unusual credit card statements and report to authorities.
What may be even more interesting to note is that Erica had been an honors student with a 4.0 GPA.
Erica remains free on bond until she reports to prison on February 24.
The original news report can be found here in the Virginian-Pilot.
Jan 19, 2010 | 19 Comments
Case Synopsis
Christmas Day
For most children, Christmas is suppose to be a fantastic day with gifts, time with the family, music, sweets, and oh more gifts. One can just imagine what it would be like for a young four-year-old girl to become sick on Christmas day.
Natasha was on a family outing on December 25, 1999 when she started complaining of feeling cold. As the family came home, Natasha developed a fever, vomited, and was visibly restless. This seemed a little more than the common cold, so Natasha’s mother took her to the Emergency Room in Hanford, California. It was 9 pm.
First Examination
In the Emergency Room, Natasha vomited again, had a dry cough and was congested. A doctor there examined her. Natasha was cooperative, alert, and appeared well-hydrated. The doctor diagnosed her with “viral infection, nausea/vomiting” and prescribed her Phenergan (which treats nausea and vomiting) and Tylenol. Natasha was sent home. Her mother was given written instructions to call her physician if conditions worsened.
NEWS STORY Jan 14, 2010
Marc Biron was a 50-year-old patient at Patton State Hospital. On January 4, early morning, he woke up and went into the bathroom. After coming back out, he promptly went into his wardrobe and hung himself. That’s where hospital staff found his body later that morning.
The caveat is that Patton State Hospital is not a typical hospital. It’s a mental facility, and Biron was being treated there as a psychiatric patient. He was described as generally well-humored, cooperative, and even played in the hospital’s band as its guitarist. There were no signs of him being suicidal. In fact, the hospital has been doing everything it could to decrease suicides, especially by hanging.
About 4 years ago, Patton was cited by federal attorneys as having a “high number of suicide attempts by hanging” because it failed to prevent future incidents. A consent judgment in 2006, which included Patton and 3 other California state hospitals, mandated a series of changes on the hospital to better take care of its patients. Brion’s suicide was the third at Patton since the changes were imposed and the ninth amongst the 4 hospitals. Patton’s last suicide was about a year ago when Augie Solez hanged himself on the door hinge with his bedsheets. Those door hinges have been changed in response, but the staff is still working on the wardrobes.
In other news regarding hospitals under judgment, remember Kings County Hospital in New York? A Jamaican woman died in its psychiatric unit in July two years ago. While waiting more than 24 hours to be treated, she collapsed and died on the floor from blood clots. The heads of the psychiatric department were all fired, the staff went through retraining, and earlier this week we found out that the court will be monitoring the hospital for 5 years with mandated reforms. Hopefully nothing like that will happen again.
NEWS STORY Jan 11, 2010
While this story isn’t a “medical mishap,” it certainly is an example of the crazy things some doctors do regarding their profession.
One morning in February of last year, the head of the Arkansas Medical Board, Dr. Trent Pierce, was getting ready to step into his car when an explosion ripped apart his vehicle and left him blind in his left eye. He also lost a significant portion of his hearing and was severely burned.
Soon after, the police identified a man named Randeep Mann, 51 years old, as a suspect because of repeated run-ins with the medical board. Randeep Mann was a doctor that specialized in pain management.
Twice, the medical board had revoked Dr. Mann’s ability to prescribe narcotics because some of his patients died or suffered brain damage from drug overdoses. As a pain specialist, being unable to prescribe medications effectively ended his ability to continue his medical practice. He was understandably upset at the board and also at Dr. Pierce who was its chairman. Dr. Mann sued the board twice claiming discrimination, but was unsuccessful.
Not long after the bombing, police searched Dr. Mann’s property and found a cache of weapons and explosives, including a grenade launcher. Besides being a doctor, Dr. Mann was also a licensed weapons dealer. And as one might suspect, some of the weapons he had were not legally registered. This led Federal prosecutors to charge Dr. Mann with possession of unregistered firearms. He pled not guilty to those charges. At that time, however, he was not charged in connection to the February bombing of Dr. Pierce.
After almost a year of investigation, a federal grand jury last week indicted Dr. Mann with 3 charges in relation to the bombing. Included is a charge of “using a weapon of mass destruction against a person or property.” If convicted, he could be sentenced to life in prison. His wife is also facing charges of lying to investigators and obstruction of justice.
NEWS STORY Jan 07, 2010
A federal grand jury indicted Dr. Richard Lopez, Jr. on Wednesday for lying and falsifying reports of a liver transplant he performed about six years ago. Back then, he was the head of the liver transplant program at St. Vincent Medical Center.
In September 2003, a liver became available and was intended for a Saudi Arabian man, who happened to be out of the country. At that time, Dr. Lopez should have notified officials that the intended recipient was unavailable and allowed the liver to go to the backup patient at a nearby hospital. Instead, according to prosecutors, he ordered the liver to be put into another man (also from Saudi Arabia) that was 52nd on the waiting list.
At first, St. Vincent reported the name of actual recipient to the United Network for Organ Sharing (the national organization that coordinates organ transplants). However, Dr. Lopez later changed that report to name the original intended recipient. That patients’s name was then removed from the waiting list, even though Dr. Lopez continued to tell him that he was still on the list. He died a few months later.
Two years after the incident, others at St. Vincent finally uncovered the conspiracy and reported it to authorities. Although the charges mentioned some unnamed accomplices, only Dr. Lopez was prosecuted because he was considered the “architect of the coverup.” It is of note that Dr. Lopez is still a licensed physician in California with no disciplinary actions on his record. His motive also remains unclear.
The man who actually received the transplant is alive and well today.
NEWS STORY Jan 04, 2010
Remember the “Octomom” from last year? To jog your memory, she (Nadya Suleman) gained nation-wide attention when she gave birth to octuplets (8 babies!) last January, even though she was already the mother of 6 children. This brought her to a total of 14 children conceived through in-vitro fertilization (IVF). Well, apparently her fertility doctor has been under investigation since then. It just came to public light that the California State Medical Board accused him of gross negligence in December.
Here’s what happened: typically, a during IVF, not all fresh embryos retrieved are used immediately. A couple or so are implanted into the woman, and the rest are frozen for possible future use. Contrary to standard practice, Dr. Michael Kamrava (her doctor) kept retrieving fresh embryos instead, even though there were frozen ones from his patient he could have used. By harvesting embryos from Nadya over and over again, he unnecesssarily increased her medical risk.
Not only that, he implanted many more embryos than is recommended by the American Society of Reproductive Medicine (which is 2 embryos each time for a woman as young as Nadya). Consequently, this caused the inordinate birth of 8 babies by a single woman at the same time.
The Board questions (and I am sure they are not alone in asking) why Dr. Kamrava did not refer Nadya for a mental evaluation. Why? Well Nadya repeatedly kept asking for more IVF procedures to be done–merely a few months after giving birth. Dr. Kamrava knew she already had multiple babies through IVF. On top of all this, she was a single mother (he knew that too). For some reason, Dr. Kamrava continued to help her have more babies without stopping to consider the ethics of what he was doing.
In September last year, he was kicked out of the American Society of Reproductive Medicine. Not surprisingly, he is actually not board certified in Obstetrics & Gynecology, Surgery, or Internal Medicine. In fact, he’s not board certified in any specialty at all.
The accusation continues to state that Dr. Kamrava also kept inadequate medical records and provided overdoses of medication. If the Medical Board succeeds in its action, he could lose his license to practice medicine in California.
The 13-page document is a matter of public record and can be accessed through the state’s medical board website. The LA Times has also put a copy of it online here.
NEWS STORY Dec 29, 2009
Kevin A. Lang, a 47-year old former doctor from Wisconsin, was arrested Monday on accusations of sexual assault. Lang is believed to have touched and fondled at least two female patients while they were drifting in and out of consciousness as they recovered from anesthesia, which included moving the patient’s hand to touch his penis.
Lang turned himself in to police on Monday and was given bail set at $25,000. Although Lang is accused of 4 counts of 2nd degree sexual assault, formal charges have not been filed because the District Attorney is waiting for possibly more victims to come forward. Although Lang has admitted to 11 counts of misconduct to the Wisconsin Medical Examining Board, only 3 patients have reportedly come forward so far.
Earlier this year, a female patient complained that she had woken up from anesthesia with her hand touching Lang’s penis and Lang fondling her breast. When confronted, Lang admitted to the incident, resigned his position at the clinic, and voluntarily has not practiced medicine since March 20, 2009. In addition, he underwent treatment for his recurring fascination with voyeurism and exhibitionism. In October, Lang’s medical license was suspended by the board after he admitted to committing multiple acts of sexual misconduct between 2003 and 2009 while he was practicing gastoenterology at Marshfield Clinic. The investigation by the board is separate from the criminal investigation that caused Lang’s arrest on Monday.
Here is a link to the medical board’s order: Kevin Lang Board Hearing.
