Where has the moral aspect of medical care gone???

[aprilma2rn]

I am an MA and I have worked for many different physicians over the past 10 years. Most of them treated their patients very well, but my last office has me appauled. I am in disbelief at the things that are allowed to occur in this office. I have moved on from there and taken a new position and I would really like to alert someone about the laws that are being broken in this office. First of all, I worked there for almost 2 years and I never saw anyone from OSHA ever come to check the office out. All of the other offices I've worked at we had regular visits where they would check the control logs, temps and so on. Secondly, the doctor that owns this practice pre-draws up all the injections that are given in the office. He keeps NO bottles of medications in the office at all. Once a week he will bring in a specimen bag full of syringes drawn up with specific medications. When the MA's go to give an injection (which I'm not even sure that we are even supposed to be doing that) they just pull the shot out of it's corresponding bag and give it. Sometimes they will have Rochephin already drawn and mixed sitting in the refrigerator for 1 to 2 weeks before it's given. I have done some research and I think Rocephin once mixed with Lidocaine or dilutent is only sterile for 48 hours. (Please correct me if I'm wrong on that...) Also, when we were giving flu shots already drawn up he had them all at .25cc's. I read the package insert from one of the bottles and it said that for adults to give .5cc's, which he wasn't ever. So no one getting their flu shots were even getting the proper dosing. This man is a complete fraud!! He would order complete physicals on everyone whether they needed them or not. He would later charge them advanced visits on their superbills eventhough they just came in for blood draws or nurse visits. He had a diagnostic test in office called an ANSAR and he would give this test to everyone even though the indication was only for those hypertensives over the age of 40.

What I have mentioned is just the tip of the iceberg....I could go on an on about the unethical things that they do here. Should I report this??? More importantly, if I did would anyone check this out?? He does a good job in hidding a lot of this activity.....

Any advice please ???

[Intern67]

This looks more like bad practices employed at a specific facility by a single specific person rather than an indication that the practice of medicine lacks morality.

[fungez]

Unfortunately there are a lot of quacks out there. I worked for a clinic for a while that, while they never did anything downright illegal, they cut a lot of corners, all for the sake of profits.

[Conqueror+, BSN, RN]

Where is the moral aspect of ANYTHING today? Look around. It is crumbling quite quickly under the masks of progress and enlightenment.

[aprilma2rn]

Okay...all your post are great and all but no one has answered my question. Do I report this activity??? If so, whom do I report it to??

[meandragonbrett]

Call the board of medicine or dept of health

[Altra, BSN, RN]

Agree - these are not moral quandries but legal and professional practice issues for which the practice can and should be held accountable.

For facility issues like refrigerator temps and (yikes) unlabeled syringes - your state health department.

For billing practices - does this practice see Medicare patients? See www.medicare.gov for how to report fraud/abuse.

[aprilma2rn]

Thank you!

[Intern67]

Okay...all your post are great and all but no one has answered my question. Do I report this activity??? If so, whom do I report it to??

If you really are concerned about morals, then whether you should report it or not should be a slam dunk for you.

In general, report to the organization(s) responsible for creating standards, regulating scope of practice, enforcing rules, or administering licenses.

[dscrn]

I would say, report him to the AMA, local bord of health, state board of medicine. WHY would you ever give a med that someone had drawn up...that is like one of the first things we are taught in school...

[lpnstudentin2010, LPN]

report him because you do not even know for certian what is in the syringes. it could just be water for all you know.