An expert witness goes the extra mile

A Canadian dermatologist was found guilty of professional misconduct by a disciplinary committee of the Ontario College of Physicians and Surgeons. He had been accused of rubbing his penis against the legs of two patients he was examining.

In his defense, the doctor said it couldn't have happened because he was so obese that his penis was covered by abdominal fat.

After 38 days of testimony, the committee was in effect a “hung” jury regarding the penis allegation but found against the doctor for rubbing his abdomen against the patients without "any form of warning, apology or excuse." The committee found the conduct "disgraceful, dishonorable or unprofessional."

One of several fact witnesses, not a direct party in the case but having seen the doctor, was asked how she knew it was a penis rubbing against her. She said, “I’m a woman of almost 70 years; I know what a penis is and what it feels like. I have no doubt at all that it was a penis.”

The doctor was also found guilty on charges of touching a patient's breasts under her bra without a valid clinical reason for doing so and for not giving patients a warning or explanation before removing some of their clothes.

The most interesting part of the hearing was that both the defense and the college had retained expert urologists to examine the dermatologist to see if the patients' allegations would have been possible.

The defense expert examined the dermatologist with and without an erection and said it would not have been possible for him to have done what the patients alleged.

The urologist for the college pretended to be the patient on the examining table with the dermatologist reprising his role as the examiner. At three different table positions, the urologist said he was able to feel the dermatologist's chemically induced erection.

I tried to imagine the conversation between representatives of the college and their expert witness prior to his encounter with the defendant.

College: Are you willing to be our expert?
Urologist: Yes. What do I have to do?
College: You must determine if the accused's erect penis can be felt at various heights of the examining table.
Urologist: How should I do that?
College: Just give him a drug to produce an erection, lie on the table while the defendant presses up against you, and testify about what you feel.
Urologist: Say what?

I tweeted a link to one of the newspaper articles about this case, and @Laconic_doc said he knew all along “the evidence wouldn't stand up in court.”

References:
Globenews.ca
The star.com

Universal medical licensing for doctors—a good idea that will never happen

Some well-intentioned people at the Center for American Progress say that the concept of individual state medical licenses is outdated, and states should recognize each others' licenses.

On the Health Affairs Blog, they listed many convincing reasons for this plan such as the streamlining of some requirements—many of which are unique to each state, the consolidation of such things as background checks and paperwork, decreasing costs to physicians, the fact that individual licensing has hindered the development of telemedicine, difficulty in credentialing physicians trying to help out in disasters, delays at best averaging 2 to 3 months to obtain a license in another state, and others.

On Twitter the idea was endorsed by Dr. Ashish K. Jha, a health policy researcher at Harvard. However, he wondered whether state boards would tolerate the loss of income. To me, the answer is simple. No.

To give you an idea of the magnitude of income the states receive, consider these figures.

According to the Federation of State Medical Boards (FSMB) as of 2012, there are approximately 878,000 MDs and DOs with active licenses in the United States. This includes 142,423 (16.8%) who have active licenses in two states, and 50,454 (5.9%) with licenses in three.

The average cost of a medical license and yearly renewal in each state is about $400. I was unable to determine exactly how many states require yearly renewal, but a spot check suggests that it is well over half.

I'll do the math. Using the FSMB data, there are about 192,000 doctors with active licenses in two or three states. If states recognized valid licenses from other states, they would lose about $100,000,000 in yearly revenue. (142,423 docs would no longer have to pay for one additional license and 50,454 for two additional licenses [50,454 x 2] x $400.) And to yield all medical licensing to the feds, the states would lose another $351,200,000 (878,000 x $400) every year.

The state medical boards probably couldn't even make the decision independently. Another figure which I could not obtain is how many states funnel medical licensing income into their general funds instead of using the money to investigate complaints about doctors. I know some states do so for sure, including Connecticut and Texas.

It seems many of these fees are really taxes disguised as licensing costs.

Yes, universal medical licensing is a great idea, but the states will never give up this money.

What's the point of medical licensing?

A surgeon emailed me the following (in italics).

OK, I know this is radical but consider my argument...

Medical licensing protects no-one and costs physicians hundreds to thousands of dollars each year. If a physician is negligent, can the injured party sue the state that licensed him? I'm guessing not.

When I moved to my current location, I had to send lots of documentation to the state medical board so they could verify that I was a true and competent surgeon. I provided my employer with the same info so they could also verify my credentials. Now my employer can and will get sued if I commit a negligent act and absolutely should verify my credentials prior to handing me a scalpel. But the state? It's license is useless.

Most people choose a surgeon based on recommendations and word of mouth reputation and these are by far better indicators of quality than any credentialing board. Nobody asks to see my license, and, even if they did, it would not protect them any more than their trust in the health system in which I work.

If I was in private practice and had my license displayed on my wall it may give some reassurance to my patients, but it does not say anything about the quality of my work. Most doctors who really screw up due to negligence are licensed by the state.

I contend again, that word of mouth and reputation are the best indicators of a surgeons ability, anything beyond that is useless.

Caveat emptor, "let the buyer beware" remains the mantra of the informed consumer.

Thanks for letting me vent.

Of course this is a bit of exaggeration to make a point. We obviously need some sort of medical licensing or the public would not know if we were the same as the "butt enhancement" people who operate out of motel rooms.

But it's true that we—doctors and the public—don't get much bang for our buck. As I mentioned in my post about the Texas neurosurgeon who ran amok before that state's medical board took action, licensing fees are generally used by most states as a type of tax.

For example in the state of Texas, only$11 million of the $40 million in licensing fees collected per year goes to the medical board for policing the profession. The rest is left in the state's general fund.

My state also uses medical licensing fees as a tax rather than as a means to run a more effective medical board. I wonder how many other states do the same thing?

It's interesting that the surgeon who sent me this email has the same recommendation found by a researcher who recently looked at the relationship between hospital quality and patient satisfaction. Like many others, he found that there is no such relationship.

As the article about that paper states, "He [the researcher] suggested choosing a hospital the old-fashioned way: find a doctor you trust and ask for a recommendation."

PS: I'm surprised that lawyers haven't thought of suing states for allowing bad doctors to keep licenses.