Showing posts with label prop 46. Show all posts

Friday, November 07, 2014

Yes On 45 Organization Issues A Post Election Statement.

$100 million spent by insurance companies against our two pro-consumer initiatives, coupled with an historic low voter turnout, was a recipe for consumers to lose Tuesday night.

The defeat of California Propositions 45 and 46 are a sobering reminder of the power of big corporate money in California politics when the electorate is not engaged. A mere 5 million Californians voted Tuesday, dwarfing even the worst voter turnout estimates. The insurance companies' barrage of negative advertising suppressed the vote and drove voters away from the polls.

The consumer rip-offs by health insurance companies targeted in Prop 45, and the threats to patients’ safety addressed by Prop 46, are profound problems that will not go away.
We will not give up the fight until justice is done on both fronts.
The insurance companies may have the money, but we have the truth: More must be done to rein in price gouging insurance companies and a medical-insurance complex unaccountable to injured patients, including those who suffer at the hands of impaired doctors.
The public wants protections against excessive rates, but insurance companies spent $57 million on deceptive advertising that hid their role in opposing Prop 45 and lied about its impact. Insurance price gouging is going to intensify without Proposition 45’s protections.
Health insurance companies cannot hide from rate regulation in California forever. We will continue to expose health insurance company profiteering and make the case with the public and the legislature for health insurance companies to be as accountable for the rates they charge as business, home and auto insurance companies are.
The fight for greater patient safety will go on too in the court of public opinion, the regulatory process, the legislature, the courts and, if need be, the initiative process.
The families of innocent victims of negligence deserve access to justice. All Californians deserve to know they are safe from drunk, high and negligent physicians. We won’t rest until patients are protected. Our efforts generated widespread acknowledgment of these problems that have been ignored for the better part of four decades in California.
The fight for the patient and consumer protections embodied in Props 45 and 46 is just beginning. We will continue that battle.
Insurance companies will be accountable for their rip-offs and for medical negligence. Consumers will have their day. Justice will be done.
Thanks for all you support. Stay tuned as we debrief and report back on our next steps.

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Sunday, November 02, 2014

Proposition 46 WIll Bring Improved Patient Safety Protections, Yes On 46.

LOS ANGELES (CBSLA.com) — Families of victims of medical negligence gathered Monday to urge voters to support a political effort for greater patient safety protections.
Carmen Pack – a mom who says her two children were killed due to medical negligence – and Annette Ramirez, a South Bay mother who lost her arms and legs due to infection after surgery, both say passing Proposition 46 will prevent other families from suffering similar tragedies.
Supporters say Proposition 46 creates greater accountability for medical negligence by indexing a 38-year-old cap on damages for inflation and detecting and deterring physicians’ over-prescribing and substance abuse.
U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer was among several officials on hand to endorse the Yes on 46 campaign, which released its first Spanish language television ad featuring Pack whose husband Bob is the author of Prop. 46.
The Pack’s children, Troy, 10, and Alana, 7, were killed by intoxicated driver who had been recklessly prescribed narcotics by multiple doctors at the same Kaiser hospital.
According to the Packs, they were unable to hold doctors legally accountable because of the Medical Injury Compensation Reform Act. Passed in 1975, MICRA places a $250,000 cap on noneconomic damages in medical malpractice cases.
“If your loved one is killed by medical negligence, no matter how serious or egregious and it’s a child who dies, there’s no wage loss or medical bills, you won’t get an attorney,” said Jamie Court of Consumer Watchdog.
Court says the initiative would raise the existing cap on damages to $1.1 million, giving children and seniors who cannot demonstrate lost wages as a result of their injuries a chance to hold doctors and hospitals accountable for their mistakes.
Video

Wednesday, October 29, 2014

Doctors That Harm - The Real Stories Insurance Companies Against Prop 46 Don't Want You To Know:

SAN FRANCISCO, CA -- After suspicious behavior and inconsistencies were revealed in a routine audit of controlled substances, Dr. Trindle was asked to submit to a drug test. He tested positive for Fentanyl.
At the time, Dr. Trindle was participating in a now-defunct diversion program for substance abusing physicians. Doctors were allowed to continue to practice and keep their substance abuse secret from patients. After failing five state audits, this program no longer exists; currently, there is no program for substance abusing doctors to get the help they need. Dr. Trindle eventually failed out of the program.
After his positive drug test, the Medical Board opened an investigation. Dr. Trindle admitted to a Medical Board investigator that he had stolen Fentanyl, Sufenta, and Propofol from his hospital. He also admitted to working at the hospital while under the influence. The Medical Board called Dr. Trindle's actions "potentially injurious to the patients at the hospital that he was treating."
Before the Medical Board could discipline Dr. Trindle for being impaired at work, Dr. Trindle caused a car crash with a blood alcohol level of 0.19%, more than double the legal limit. Even though the other driver had been hurt, Dr. Trindle fled the scene. He was eventually caught and arrested.
The Medical Board placed Dr. Trindle on probation, requiring random drug screenings. While on probation, Dr. Trindle tested positive for alcohol – a blatant violation of his probation. Two months later, Dr. Trindle again tested positive for alcohol. Still, the Medical Board did nothing. Finally, a positive drug test for cocaine eventually led to Dr. Trindle's surrender of his medical license.
Sources: http://www2.mbc.ca.gov/BreezePDL/default.aspx?licenseType=G&licenseNumber=63287

Proposition 46, the Troy and Alana Pack Patient Safety Act, will enact the first law in the nation to require random drug and alcohol tests of physicians in hospitals, modeled after the Federal Aviation Administration testing program that has successfully reduced substance abuse by pilots. Doctors found to be impaired on the job will have their license suspended. If Prop 46 had been in effect, Dr. Trindle’s drug and alcohol abuse may have been detected, possibly preventing threats to patient safety in the process.
Hall of Shame: Insurance Companies Backing No on 46
NorCal Mutual Insurance Company   $11,000,000.00
Cooperative of American Physicians   $10,161,489.04
The Doctors Company   $10,000,000.00
Kaiser Foundation Health Plan   $5,000,000.00
Medical Insurance Exchange of California   $5,000,000.00
The Dentists Insurance Company   $1,620,000.00
The Mutual Risk Retention Group   $1,000,000.00
All Insurers:    $43,916,007.28
Total:    $58,465,858.90
Insurance companies have spent nearly $44 million dollars to oppose Prop 46 in order to shield dangerous doctors like Dr. Trindle from punishment, at the expense of patient safety, in order to protect their already substantial profits. In total, the opposition to Prop 46 has over $58 million dollars in their warchest, outspending consumer and patient safety advocates more than 8:1.
Learn more about Proposition 46 and the campaign for patient safety at: www.yeson46.org
(The original article states the following but we were not paid for publishing this, We are doing it on our own free will)
Paid for by Yes on Prop. 46, Your Neighbors for Patient Safety, a Coalition of Consumer Attorneys and Patient Safety Advocates - major funding by Consumer Attorneys of California Issues and Initiative Defense Political Action Committees and Kabateck, Brown, Kellner, LLP.

Monday, October 27, 2014

Yes on Prop 46, One Girl's Story, Prevent Anyone Else Getting The Same Treatment!

The Real Stories Insurance Companies Against Prop 46 Don't Want You To Know

Proposition 46, the Troy and Alana Pack Patient Safety Act, will enact the first law in the nation to require random drug and alcohol tests of physicians in hospitals, modeled after the Federal Aviation Administration testing program that has successfully reduced substance abuse by pilots. Doctors found to be impaired on the job will have their license suspended. If Prop 46 had been in effect, Goldenberg's substance abuse may have been detected, possibly preventing threats to patient safety in the process.

Hall of Shame: Insurance Companies Backing No on 46

Cooperative of American Physicians   $10,161,489.04
The Doctors Company   $10,000,000.00
NorCal Mutual Insurance Company   $10,000,000.00
Kaiser Foundation Health Plan   $5,000,000.00
Medical Insurance Exchange of California   $5,000,000.00
The Dentists Insurance Company   $1,620,000.00
The Mutual Risk Retention Group   $1,000,000.00
All Insurers:    $42,781,489.04
Total:    $58,068,255.82

Insurance companies have spent nearly $43 million dollars to oppose Prop 46 in order to shield dangerous doctors like Dr. Goldenberg (See the press release below for the complete story) from punishment, at the expense of patient safety, in order to protect their already substantial profits. In total, the opposition to Prop 46 has over $58 million dollars in their warchest, outspending consumer and patient safety advocates who support Prop 46 nearly 8:1.

Learn more about Proposition 46 and the campaign for patient safety at: www.yeson46.org

Press Release;

Doctors That Harm: The Real Stories Insurance Companies Against Prop 46 Don't Want You To Know, Part 8 of Consumer Watchdog Campaign Series Today's series covers Dr. Melvin Gurney - Impaired-At-Work Physician Ingested An Average Of 10,000 Pills Per Year

SANTA ROSA, Calif., Oct. 24, 2014 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- In 2008, two of Dr. Gurney's employees reported that he was ordering large quantities of multiple controlled substances, on a regular basis, that were not used for patient care. They also reported that Dr. Gurney was practicing "all the time" while under the influence. The Medical Board reported that one of his employees said that Dr. Gurney was prone to "making mistakes in his care and treatment of patients."

Dr. Gurney's behavior became increasingly erratic and unfocused, and his drug deliveries were increased every three weeks for about 800-900 pills at a time. An employee also reported that Dr. Gurney was regularly ordering 10-20 syringes of a powerful sedative, even though they did not use such medicine in their practice.

When Medical Board investigators finally visited Dr. Gurney, they asked if he would submit to a drug test and he refused, demanding an attorney. Then, saying that "something had come up," Dr. Gurney left California for a month. An employee then told investigators that Dr. Gurney "seemed to be impaired almost every day and that he seemed to get worse in the last few months." She also reported that syringes, filled with Lidocaine, would disappear.

When Dr. Gurney returned to California, he refused to answer the Medical Board's questions, including why he kept all the drugs in a locked safe only he had access to, if he had ever used any controlled drugs in his office, and he refused to tell the Board what prescriptions he was taking or who had prescribed the drugs to him.

Dr. Gurney eventually admitted that he began self-prescribing pain medications in 2003 or 2004. He said that after about a year, he was taking two pills every 4 hours and injecting himself with Versed. By 2006, he was using daily, including 8mg per day of Xanax, 3-4 tablets of Ambien, 16 tablets of opioid analgesics, as well as a sedative. He admitted that the large amounts of controlled substances he had ordered were for personal use. Dr. Gurney also admitted that he felt impaired while practicing medicine.

Over a three year period, Dr. Gurney had used more than 30,000 pills, including Xanax, Vicodin, Ambien, Percocet, Fentanyl, and Morphine. In 2012, he finally surrendered his medical license.

Source: http://www2.mbc.ca.gov/BreezePDL/default.aspx?licenseType=G&licenseNumber=60352

Hall of Shame: Insurance Companies Backing No on 46

Insurance companies have spent nearly $43 million dollars to oppose Prop 46 in order to shield dangerous doctors like Dr. Goldenberg from punishment, at the expense of patient safety, in order to protect their already substantial profits. In total, the opposition to Prop 46 has over $58 million dollars in their warchest, outspending consumer and patient safety advocates who support Prop 46 nearly 8:1.

Learn more about Proposition 46 and the campaign for patient safety at: www.yeson46.org

Paid for by Yes on Prop. 46, Your Neighbors for Patient Safety, a Coalition of Consumer Attorneys and Patient Safety Advocates - major funding by Consumer Attorneys of California Issues and Initiative Defense Political Action Committees and Kabateck, Brown, Kellner, LLP.

SOURCE Consumer Watchdog Campaign

Health Insurance Companies Spend $55 Million To Defeat Prop 45 In California!

"While the health insurance company executives celebrate their riches on the back nine of the Sea Cliff Country Club, average Californians who don't have the protection of rate regulation are having to choose between paying their mortgage and paying for health insurance," said Court. "Prop 45 is there to protect these policyholders who have been paying too much on their health insurance for too long because Californians don't have the same protections against rate hikes as 35 other states do."

For more on Prop 45 visit: http://www.yeson45.org

The Press Release.

SANTA MONICA, Calif., Oct. 20, 2014 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- On Saturday, the three big health insurance companies that control California's health insurance market gave another $12 million to their campaign to defeat Proposition 45, which will give California the authority to stop health insurance rate overcharges.

The total insurance industry spending against Consumer Watchdog's Prop 45 now tops $55 million, with just two weeks until Election Day. Total insurance industry spending against Prop 45 and 46 now exceeds $100 million.

"The big health insurance companies are panicked that the public will learn the truth about their opposition to Prop 45 and support its controls against rate hikes so they are doubling down on their deceptive television advertising campaign to confuse voters," said Jamie Court, president of Consumer Watchdog and author of Prop 45. "The industry is worried that with enough light and air around the election the public will learn the truth that insurance companies are opposed to Prop 45 because it gives California the power 35 other states already have to reject excessive rates."

The deceptive insurance industry campaign against Prop 45 conceals the opposition of the big four insurance companies that control 84% of the individual and small business market that Prop 45 will regulate. The $12 million insurance companies added to their eleventh hour advertising will unleash a barrage of confusing advertising on the public, Consumer Watchdog said.

The Mercury News "Ad Watch" this weekend found the insurance companies' anti-Prop 45 advertising to be "mostly untrue": http://www.mercurynews.com/news/ci_26754321/new-anti-prop-45-tv-ad-misleads-viewers?source=rss#disqus_thread

This week the trade association for the big four health insurance companies is gathering at a beach side hotel in Huntington Beach at a convention attended by top officials from Covered California, the so-called "independent commission" the health insurance company advertising erroneously claims has the power to reject rates. Today the companies are hosting a golf tournament at the exclusive Sea Cliff Country Club for attendees.