More on patient blacklisting

Victims of botched cosmetic surgery often end up on the blacklists of surgeons most skilled and qualified to help them. Frequently, it takes years for such patients to realize they have been blacklisted. From "DEADLY MEDICAL PRACTICES" by Trudy Newman:

"There are basically two different stratifications with patients being given a designation of either “high priority” or “low priority.” Patients with a high priority status will receive the best care available. Patients who, unbeknownst to them, receive a low priority status will get only minimal, rationed or experimental care. Patients are under tested and under treated—if they are treated at all. Alternatively, patients with a low priority status may be over tested, but they will be denied proper care or treatment. The patient may find that he is tested to death with the wrong tests being ordered for his condition. Especially vulnerable are those with chronic illnesses, the elderly, and any others whom physicians deem undesirable."

"Patients who dare to question or challenge their doctor’s authority, or the medical treatment that they receive, may find that they become BLACKLISTED ... Physicians demonstrate a stronger allegiance to their colleagues, than they do towards their innocent and trusting patients. Patients with iatrogenic illnesses often become victims of the blacklist. The problems usually start when medical mistakes are made (either intentionally or unintentionally) and denied. Then the lies and cover-up begin. Documents are often modified, falsified, mysteriously disappear, or important information is excluded from the record. Doctors will go to great lengths to avoid being held accountable, and are generally protected by their professional associations. Once the patient is blacklisted he can then expect to be subjected to character assassination from the medical profession. The patient can anticipate being attacked, discredited and demonized. How dare a patient challenge a doctor's authority? To avoid taking any responsibility for their errors, actions or behavior, doctors--and their governing bodies--will often employ the same tactics that communist countries use to quash political dissent. The patient will be labeled "difficult" or "psychiatric." Such pejorative labels are given to divert attention away from the negligent, incompetent or malpracticing doctor. Patients should not take such labels personally, because these labels say more about the physicians than they do about the patients. Blacklisting is not an error. Blacklisting is an intentional act."

"Because a patient is dealing with their doctor in good faith, it will often take a patient several years to realize what is happening. Once the veil has been lifted and the trusting patient realizes that he is being blacklisted, and is no longer in denial, he may initially experience a sense of shame questioning what he did wrong to deserve such treatment. This shame is usually transient, because after careful examination and reflection the patient rightfully realizes that he is truly the victim. Sensitive patients may experience shame for the doctor’s depravity and lack of moral character. The patient will then move on to experience a righteous indignation. Because of the incredible abuse that a patient endures, he will often experience unbelievable pain and intense anger. Unfortunately, patients are often isolated and left to try to deal with this trauma on their own. "

"Patients who pursue the complaint process through the College of Physicians and Surgeons [in Canada- in the US through State Medical Licensing Boards] because of the substandard care that they have received--often find that they are victimized a second time, because their complaints are not dealt with honestly, fairly or objectively. In the letter that outlines the conclusions of the review, the patient may find that he is attacked by the very organization he was petitioning for assistance. Patients discover that there isn’t an independent outlet to correct and resolve physician error or problems. This additional abuse from the complaint process exacerbates the existing trauma and isolation that the patient is already trying to deal with. "

"Because of the medical profession’s CODE OF SILENCE, the public is often unaware of physicians’ corrupt practices of covert rationing and blacklisting patients. Many patients are afraid to speak out about these abuses, because they fear RETALIATION by the medical community. Retaliation is a legitimate fear. Patients will often find emotional healing only when they are able to connect with other patients who are also being abused and bullied by the medical profession. " [ However, emotional healing cannot restore the victim's functional LIFE as denied appropriate medical treatment can. How many blacklisted patients lives could be restored, but are left to suffer and die because the medical profession engages in blacklisting as a normal and accepted practice?]

MGH Plastic Surgery - Not interested in learning from "unfavorable outcomes"

Going through some older files, I happened across a phone message from Dr. James May, cancelling my appointment after suffering severe tissue damage after a rhinoplasty supervised by Dr. Joel Feldman. The rhinoplasty was performed too soon after a facelift, causing massive swelling which permanently stretched and detached the newly forming adhesion of the facelift. Dr. May's message (and Dr. Feldman's inadequate physical examination) exemplify the tendency of these professors of plastic surgery to ignore/discount problematic outcomes. They just sweep the dirt of their mistakes under the rug and move on to the next patient/victim.

Inadequate physical examination belies surgeons' sincerity

Reflection on my "attitude" - 2006 and now. If anything, surgeons' attitudes have reinforced my mistrust and proved their duplicity.

Should I hold onto the hope that in another country, doctors of another culture living in a different society than ours might recognize a sincere patient when they see one?

Doctor keeps botched cosmetic surgery quiet

by Deidre Mussen - Sunday Star Times

A DOCTOR made a patient sign a confidentiality agreement about her botched breast enlargement at a top Auckland private hospital, a women's health group has revealed.

Her horror story comes as the Medical Council ups the ante against rogue doctors performing cosmetic procedures.

Women's Health Action Trust director Jo Fitzpatrick told the Sunday Star-Times that the doctor waived some of his fee in exchange for the woman's silence.

Fitzpatrick said the woman was too terrified to speak out and a friend contacted the trust at the end of last year to urgently seek help.

"She had weeping wounds she was a complete mess. She ended up getting so disfigured, she wouldn't go out. It's the worst case we've come across."

The doctor tried to repair the damage but failed.

The woman was worried about breaching the confidentiality agreement, so the trust told her to say she had been operated on overseas.

"We hoped once she got help, the real story would come out."

Last October, the Medical Council released guidelines setting standards doctors had to meet to perform various cosmetic procedures after a number of botched cases raised concerns. Doctors had until this year to ensure their skills were up to the required level.

"There had been procedures that had gone wrong and we felt we had to make clear what sort of training is required," council chairman John Campbell said.

Some doctors had stopped offering certain procedures, particularly liposuction, because they failed to meet the new criteria, he said. Two doctors contacted the council this year to check whether they had sufficient training for the cosmetic surgery they offered, discovered they did not and had to stop. Another doctor was under investigation after the council received a complaint about him performing cosmetic surgery.

This week, as part of a safety push in the growing cosmetic surgery industry, the council plans to release a new brochure educating patients on what to expect. It specifies the training doctors require and how patients can find out if their doctor passes the council's criteria. It also gives patients questions to ask doctors, details information needed and highlights possible risks.

The brochure also discusses what should happen before and after procedures, plus what to do if anything goes wrong. It will be sent to medical centres, GP practices and plastic and reconstructive surgeons nationwide.

But Foundation for Cosmetic Plastic Surgery president Tristan de Chalain, an Auckland-based cosmetic and reconstructive plastic surgeon, said the council's guidelines were too lax.

The foundation recently complained to the council about an Auckland dermatologist who was performing breast augmentation.

"We have very little protection for the public here. There are still huge loopholes."

However, he praised the council for its efforts to tighten standards.

Health commissioner Ron Paterson had called for tighter restrictions on cosmetic procedures, including better patient education, after some high-profile cases, including one involving a botched genital operation.

Fitzpatrick said she knew of three women who had complained to the trust about that Auckland gynaecologist, but only one had laid a formal complaint.

"Cosmetic surgery is a very difficult area for women to complain about when things go wrong because they blame themselves. Only one woman was brave enough to complain and it's great that she got findings in her favour."

Judge Rejects Plastic Surgeon Brian West's Attempt to Get a Restraining Order Against a Former Patient

Not all judges grant restraining orders without legitimate grounds. This was an attempt by Dr. West to silence injured patients from publishing negative experiences with him on the Internet.

By DAFFODIL J. ALTAN Thursday, August 14, 2008 - 3:01 pm

Cutting Remarks

Plastic surgeon Brian West tries to get a restraining order against a former patient who got him into trouble with the state

Brian West, a plastic surgeon who practiced most recently in Huntington Beach and who is about to go on trial with the Medical Board of California for violating the terms of the board’s alcohol-abuse treatment program, is convinced one of his former patients is violently stalking him.

He’s so convinced that in mid-July, he filed for a restraining order against the former patient, Tina Minasian, as well as for one against the husband of another former patient.

“Whenever she loses in a court of law, she turns violent,” the burly, soft-spoken West nervously told a judge at a Los Angeles Superior Courthouse in Santa Monica last week. He held a stack of evidence, including printed copies of Web pages from MySpace and the site Minasian started, “Brian West MD—Bad Plastic Surgeon.”

With his buxom wife, Leighann West, by his side as a key witness, West described how he had received anonymous death threats and was afraid for his children’s safety as a result of Minasian’s relentless web activity. He told the judge he has opened a criminal stalking case with the Los Angeles Police Department.

Minasian is almost single-handedly responsible for the slew of medical-board accusations West will face in September. The hearings could result in the revocation of West’s license.

West performed a body-lift on Minasian in 2002 while practicing in Sacramento. Minasian filed a malpractice suit in 2005 after her wound healed horribly, she says. As reported in the Weekly (see “Under Wraps,” Jan. 10), just before her case went to trial, Minasian found out West was under investigation by the state medical board. She went to two of the board’s hearings and learned about West’s failure to stay sober while he was in the board’s Diversion Program—and while she was his patient.

The highly confidential program (the public were not allowed to know if their doctor was involved) gave practicing physicians with drug- and alcohol-abuse problems a way out of license revocation if they agreed to attend rehab sessions and take random urine tests. It was permanently abolished this year after failing five audits during its 27-year existence.

The board allowed West to keep his license in 2005 and put him on probation, despite his having relapsed four times while in the program. He relocated to Los Angeles and has practiced in Beverly Hills, Long Beach and Huntington Beach.

Minasian lost her malpractice case against West but learned that she could file a complaint with the state medical board. Minasian also learned the board was unaware of the dozen or so patients who had filed lawsuits against West because separate complaints were never filed with the board. She then began finding other patients who experienced similar bad outcomes after their surgeries with West—patients who had been seeing him during the time he had relapsed and been arrested for a second DUI. Minasian convinced many such patients to file complaints with the board. Many also detailed their stories, complete with gory pictures, on Minasian’s website.

Minasian’s journey didn’t stop there. She has made local and national rounds, along with other former patients, in an effort to advocate for patient safety and expose what she feels was a failed state diversion program. Their stories—and West’s—have been covered by the AP, CNN and Fox News.

All of this negative coverage has made his life a living hell, West told the judge last week. Minasian’s violent streak, he said, increases every time she suffers a loss in her battles with him. The latest, West stated in court documents, was the medical board’s recent decision that Minasian’s specific case would no longer be heard by them along with the others’ in September.

In the Santa Monica courtroom, an impatient Judge John Reid asked West if he had ever been physically assaulted or received death threats directly from Minasian, who lives hundreds of miles away in Sacramento. The ruddy-faced physician said no, not exactly. He pointed to a MySpace page that he alleged Minasian opened in his name.

That and the website with patients’ stories weren’t enough to convince the judge of her violent streak. “That’s cause for a civil lawsuit,” Reid said of the Internet activity. “To get what you want, you have to show that you’ve been attacked, stricken, assaulted and that there is perceived injury or threat to you and your family.”

In an interview, Minasian described West’s restraining-order efforts as “his attempt to compromise my First Amendment rights and to keep me from being called as a witness in September.” Minasian said she and Ken Mikulecky, the husband of a former patient who was named in the second restraining order filed by West, couldn’t afford to fly down for the brief hearing.

First Amendment lawyer James Leonard, who flew in from Oakland to represent the pair pro bono, didn’t have to make much of a case. The judge rejected West’s request after about 15 minutes of deliberation, reiterating several times that a restraining order was not “the proper vehicle” for what West was seeking. “If you were defamed, file your lawsuit,” he told the doctor.

daltan@ocweekly.com

What brings you here?

What brings people to this blog? Here are some examples of what people enter into search engines (mostly Google) to arrive here:

I have an ugly face

rhinoplasty swelling journey

ugly plastic surgery (very common search)

bad male rhino

ugly plastic surgery pictures (very common search)

splitting sutures facelift

ugly breast photos

ugly lips photos

plastic surgery ugly (very common search)

cosmetic surgery nightmare

ugliest plastic surgery

ugly surgery pictures (very common search)

disastrous plastic surgery pictures

neck swelling tissue hard plastic surgery

plastic surgery for very rich

ugly breasts

ugly need plastic surgery

cosmetic lip surgery malpractice

cosmetic surgery for true medical reason

you tube ugliest face operations

ugly breast implants

cosmetic surgery victims

medical malpractice breasts

does having rhinoplasty too soon after facelift cause damage to facelift (My favorite)

plastic surgery to be ugly

plastic surgery rules to revision

cosmetic surgery side effects

plastic surgery business suffering

plastic surgery victims

plastic surgery lawsuit

power lift cosmetic surgery complaints

how to fix ugly plastic surgery

am i crazy to want cosmetic surgery

plastic surgery catastrophe

malpractice liposuction documentary

what is the bad side of cosmetic surgery

ugly after plastic surgery

you tube cosmetic facelift

you tube defamation complaints

10 things plastic surgeon

rhinoplasty for my birthday

cosmetic surgery peer review

cosmetic surgery deaths

botched trigger finger surgery

malpractice of plastic surgeons

botched cosmetic surgery

patient accuses plastic surgeon of inappropriate

consent form for cosmetic surgery by a resident

false operative reports

malpractice and comments of plastic surgeon

facelift tough skin male

swallowing difficulties with neck lift surgery
~~~~

I have excluded surgeons' names entered into searches which direct them to this blog, but they are surprisingly numerous. Most just search the doctor's name, but some are phrased:

Dr. X facelift
Dr. X malpractice
Dr. X in City, State

You get the picture. I hope they find what they are looking for.

You come from all over the world:

Japan
Finland
Australia
Spain
UK
Canada
Israel
Netherlands
Italy
Belgium
France
Germany
India
Poland
Denmark
Mexico
Greece
Aland Islands
Ireland
Singapore
Hungary
New Zealand
Switzerland
Philippines
Latvia
Nepal
Hong Kong
Egypt
Austria
Luxembourg
Sweden

Just a little FYI