On two separate occasions, on which Sutter E.R. doctors have misdiagnosed both me and my husband, they caused lasting harmful medical consequences.
For this reason, among others pertaining to Sutter's uncaring attitude toward serious dangers to patients and to the general public of infection, illegalities such as falsification of medical records, spoliation of legal evidence in a public interest antitrust lawsuit, aggressive acts to keep patients within the Sutter system against medical interests of such patients, and the real-life medical consequences to patients of these factors: if time allows in an emergency we now avoid Sutter E.R.'s, and plan to entrust our urgent care to the UCSF-MarinHealth After-Hours Clinic on Rowland Way. If the nature of the emergency allows, we will arrange to be transported to MarinHealth in Greenbrae or UCSF emergency in San Francisco. Their fraudulent profit-taking is related to subjecting patients to unnecessary radiation exposure in the setting of inflated diagnostic code and failure to maintain a cumulative record of millisieverts patients receive over time.
When their E.R. doctor misdiagnosed an infection, (and their second E.R. doctor deceitfully covered up the fact, causing the critical period for antibiotic prevention to pass) they together caused an autoimmune flare that has lasted for years and continues in the present time.
When I complained, "risk manager," telephoned me, posing as their person in charge of improving quality of patient care, asked if my most recent autoimmune tests had yet been posted, I said no, and when the autoimmune test result was just after that call was posted, it was a falsified lab test report indicating that I had no autoimmune illness. Such falsification of medical records is illegal, and theoretically law provides for a huge fine and imprisonment. Knowing I was still sick, I then confirmed that Sutter had falsified the medical record, by soon after having the tests repeated at UCSF, and the UCSF labs resulted positive for antiphospholipid antibody disorder.
Years later, there being no deterrent to Sutter's illegalities, in Dec. 2017, San Francisco County Superior Court Judge Karnow found that Sutter had deliberately destroyed 192 boxes of evidence in an antitrust lawsuit that was brought because their monopoly enables them to charge 70% higher than medical institutions elsewhere in California. And now, reported in Nov. 2019, Sutter is paying another $30 million penalty, this time for kickback to doctors in exchange for patient referrals, in violation of federal and state kickback statutes. The SacBee reports Sutter is paying $30 million to settle a secret kickback lawsuit, explaining the connection between this fraud, kickbacks, and patient health. Again, 2019, the U.S. Dept. of Justice has announced Sutter's having to pay an additional $15.1 million to settle a lawsuit alleging double-billing.
Earlier this year, in April, Sutter Health settled a Medicare Advantage upcoding case for $30 million Sutter Health, a fraudulent billing of MediCare in which they exaggerate the seriousness of a patient's illness/health risk in order to get higher payments than they are legally entitled to. In this context, my husband subsequently received what we are certain to have been an upcoded diagnosis of "TIA," sending us down a rabbit hole of adverse drug reactions to drugs subsequently prescribed for this upcoded diagnosis. Further, while in the E.R. the E.R. doctor was rude, burned out, and tried to get my husband to take the very drugs that have caused him life-threatening hemorrhage in the past. Further, Sutter failed to forward his records to our doctors at UCSF when they said they would, which I found out from UCSF a full week after they said they would honor my request to send them, to our doctors there . I noticed on the way to their medical records their patient waiting area was still filthy, despite their having known for years that patients die of drug-resistant superbugs caught in hospitals.
As illustrated in our case, monopolies abuse the public and violate laws with impunity. This disrespect and numerous impositions upon the public is bad enough in, for example, a telecom company, but can be deadly in a health services monopoly. read more
