Why the Medical Community Needs to Screen

4,569 actions were reported by the medical boards in 1999. Of the 4,520 total actions taken 3,838 were prejudicial to the physicians and were taken for violations such as quality care, sexual misconduct, insurance fraud, alcohol/substance abuse or inappropriate prescribing of controlled substance. Source: Federations of State Boards (FSMB)
20,125 physicians were the subject of some disciplinary action by state medical board or other governmental agency, resulting in nearly 39,000 disciplinary actions. While 3,000 physicians were guilty of felony offense. There is no way to calculate how many criminal violations were never reported. Source:Public Health Citizen's Research Group in Washington DC
"In the cases where employees have been injured in the workplace by co-workers, and it is later discovered that the company did not check references and criminal convictions or get a background report-----which would have readily disclosed that this person had a problem ----the companies have been sued for negligent hiring." Source: Nursing management, April 19996
"In the past, most organizations relied heavily on employment interviews or personal profiles to determine an applicants potential honesty quotient. In the era of corporate compliance, health care organizations must take a much more aggressive approach to screening applicants. Building an effective screening program involves taking a fresh look at existing approaches and investigating the applicants work background completely. This is a new and in some cases distasteful, departure from previous employment methods." Source: Healthcare Risk Management, May 1998
1,129 medical malpractice payments were made due to obstetrics in the United States in 2002. Source: 2002 Annual Report, National Practitioner Data Bank USDHHS
264 obstetrics related malpractice payment reports were made against registered nurses in the United States 1990-2002. Source: 2002 Annual Report, National Practitioner Data Bank USDHHS
1,000 medical malpractice reports were made to the National Practitioner Databank regarding nurse anesthetist in the US 1990-2004. Source NPDB Summary Report, National Practitioner Data Bank US DHHS
1,949 (14.5%) nurses and nursing-related practitioners had a malpractice report made against them in the US in 2003. Source:2003 Annual Report National Practitioner Data Bank US DHHS
1.14 million total patient safety incidents occurred among 37 million hospitalizations in the US 2000-02. Source: Patient Safety in American Hospitals Health Grades 2004
2,591 new cases of foreign bodies left in during procedures occurred in the US 2000-02. Source: Patient Safety in American Hospitals Health Grades 2004
Estimated 44,000-98,000 deaths from Medical mistakes in hospitals. Source: Institute of Medicine.
Health care providers that hire unqualified or sanctioned physicians or other health care professionals can face legal and financial disaster. Financial liability for acts and misconduct of employees is becoming one of the most significant areas of exposure for health care organizations. The exposure occurs because a health care provider can be held liable for injuries resulting from failure to adequately screen the physicians it hires. Also federal laws strictly limits program payments to a healthcare randomization that engages the services of individuals on certain sanction lists.