On The Puffings Of The Eminent Dr. Olson Huff: If We're Going To Really Reform Healthcare, It's Time To Reconcile Asheboro's "Ancient History" To The Here And Now

Government is not the doctor.  It is the disease.  - H.S. Ferns


Early yesterday morning, against my better judgement, I attended one of those much-ballyhooed CME (Continuing Medical Education) teleconferences where a Pediatric Grand Rounds presentation at ECU is projected through the ether to all of the rural affiliates in their system.

It's the wave of the future, dontchaknow.

In this case, the speaker was American Academy of Pediatrics bigwig (and North Carolina's own), Dr. Olson Huff, Chairman of the AAP's Committee on Federal Government Affairs.  The topic was how Healthcare Reform impacted the care of the Medically-Complex child.

Trouble was, Huff's presentation had very little to do with the specifics of what heatlhcare reform is actually going to accomplish for the Medically-Complex child. An hour of my life was sucked away by what amounted to little more than a politically-polarized, cheer-leading session for the Patient Protection And Affordable Care Act (aka "Obamacare").

It's all for the children. As Huff broadly dismissed the concerns of conservatives from his bully-pulpit (and scoffed at any challenges to Obamacare as its currently legislated), conservatives in his audience were pretty much forced to sit and silently seethe.

We in the medical field are not anything if we're not publicly "collegial".

It's been a long time since I've attended an "academic" lecture, but the brazen, shameless way in which Huff politicized his points blew my mind.  I don't ever remember seeing this kind of thing back when I was training at Bowman Gray/NCBH.

The sessions are supposed to be interactive - with questions and answers afterwards, but we backwoods heathens can mute our audio feeds. It's probably a good thing for Dr. Olson that I did. Probably for me too, given what I might have said to him on a more level playing field.

But the field was NOT level.  For on the eminent Dr. Huff's playing field, situations like mine (I know ALL about trying to take care of medically-complex children in rural settings and with limited resources - with lawyers hovering over your every move) do not exist.

I do not exist. It's crystal clear these days that the higher-ups in the ivory towers of medical education & advocacy are not really interested in hearing the ugly truth from the front lines - unless it serves their progressive "government knows/does best" agenda.

MY STORY DOES NOT FIT THAT AGENDA. THE TRUTH IS JUST TOO INCONVENIENT FOR THE DR. HUFFS OF THIS WORLD. 

ERGO, WHAT WAS DONE TO DR. MARY JOHNSON IN ASHEBORO - RIGHT UNDER DR. HUFF'S EMINENT NOSE - MUST BE IGNORED AND BURIED, LEST THE KEPT-IN-THE-DARK PLEBES PAYING THE BILLS GET A CLUE ABOUT HOW THOROUGHLY THEY'VE BEEN RIPPED OFF BY PUBLIC SERVANTS PROFESSING TO HAVE THEIR SAFETY AND WELL-BEING AT HEART . . .

. . . AND LEST THE IDEALISTIC PEDIATRIC NEWBIES IN HUFF'S AUDIENCE HEAR IT, TAKE IT TO HEART, AND DECIDE NOT TO PUT THEIR LIVES AND CAREERS AT RISK BY TAKING THE BAIT.

And/so, like my good, well-named, friend Buzz Armfield-of-the-Asheboro Armfields is not going to be invited to any of the "right people's" parties at the local country clubs or Rotary, Dr. Mary is not ever going to be welcome at any tables set by the Huffsters at the AAP or AMA.

She certainly didn't get any invites before Dr. Huff and company signed off on the PPACA

I've digressed. Another very good friend of mine and I were talking about some scuttlebutt surrounding the Randolph County DA's office this past weekend, when he mentioned that, in discussing said scuttlebutt with another well-connected acquaintance, the mere mention of my case against Randolph Hospital caused the well-connected-lady to "blow up in his face".

For the record, that his well-connected acquaintance was a Democrat - you know, the party that tells you it's all about social truth and justice.

My friends and I are thinking that if the well-named and well-connected of Asheboro are touchy enough about the subject of Mary Johnson to "blow up" about it . . . if they're THAT much on the defensive . . . well, then I'm clearly doing something right.

In her big blow, my friend's well-connected, deep-blue acquaintance spewed all the progressive (i.e. skip-along-to-the-future-over-the-dead-bodies-of-people-who-don't-matter) party-line stuff worthy of the "expert" lawyers who suborned perjury for Randolph Hospital's executives:  "It's ancient history", he was told. "Unproven allegations." "Perjury is virtually never prosecuted in North Carolina".  "It was only a civil suit." "The DA has total discretion."

Oh, and saving the best for last, "Everybody lies in Court". 

(And no one can understand why our world is in the toilet!?!)

In thinking about it, I supposed that last tidbit of wisdom is so. On the other hand, everyone does not get caught red-handed lying so brazenly under Oath (when it comes to "unproven allegations, I'm thinking it's kind of hard to argue with the original sworn discovery documents . . . unless you just don't investigate the crime at all) . . . in a fashion that cost the victim of their crime so much. We'll get to all that in a minute.

As we were sitting in front of my computer at the time of our discussion, and my friend asked me to clarify the law for purposes of future debate, I quickly Googled (two-tenths-of-a-second) the General Statute for perjury in North Carolina (two Housecall's posts came up on page one):

SUBCHAPTER VIII. OFFENSES AGAINST PUBLIC JUSTICE.

Article 28.

Perjury

14‑209. Punishment for perjury.

If any person shall willfully and corruptly commit perjury, on his oath or affirmation, in any suit, controversy, matter or cause, depending in any of the courts of the State, or in any deposition or affidavit taken pursuant to law, or in any oath or affirmation duly administered of or concerning any matter or thing whereof such person is lawfully required to be sworn or affirmed, every person so offending shall be punished as a Class F felon.

Of course, my almost thirteen years of getting screwed over by two unconvicted Class F felons in Asheboro, North Carolina proves that this statute . . . the law of our land . . . is not worth the paper it's printed on.

I'm not a member of the Asheboro bar (pun intended), but the language of the statute does seem to cover civil suits, not to mention what Garland Yates should have done when the crimes were reported to him in 2003 . . . and he had a victim SCREAMING for prosecution. 

The Statute doesn't say ANYTHING about "right people" running "non-profit" hospitals being exempt from the consequences of lying under Oath.

What these over-rated, WAY over-paid weasels-with-MBA's did cost me a medical practice in my hometown, completely decimated opportunities for fellowship/other career advancement, totally derailed my personal life, and almost cost me my home. 

Make NO mistake.  I'm NOT getting over it and I'm NOT going away.  I want EVERYONE EVERYWHERE to know what the people running Randolph Hospital - and Asheboro, North Carolina - are capable of.  I want to be the WORST NIGHTMARE of the marketing gurus working feverishly to improve the City of Asheboro's image.

Home and heart?  Small town values?  PUHLEASE!

Of course, the fury always simmering in the background of my life courtesy of YEARS of insult & injury has been recently stoked by the irony that I spent much of that time grovelling and pleading my case to CRIMINALS like ex-Governor Mike "I'm a convicted felon" Sleazely Easley and former Senator John "If God is merciful & just, I'll be a convicted felon soon" Edwards . . . both of them lawyers . . . one of them the former Attorney General of North Carolina.

Before my head explodes, let's move on.  In North Carolina, perjury has no statute of limitations . . . because, theoretically at least, it's spits in the eye justice . . . it is an act of utter contempt towards the Court and We-The-Put-Upon-People.

In other words, folks, that "ancient history" MATTERS.

Also, in North Carolina, DA's and judges have the discretion to order convicted criminals to fairly compensate their victims as a part of any lesser plea deal.

In my own case, as things currently stand, and as the senior "partner" wrongfully terminated, scrorned, slandered and swindled, I'd consider twelve years back-pay at something a little over Kathleen Riley "private practice" rates (if Randolph Hospital can pay Bob Morrison over $700,000/year, they're far from "nearly bankrupt", and clearly can afford it) . . . a full & unconditional public apology to me and my family . . . and a guilty plea (not an Alford plea) by Bob Morrison and Steven Eblin to one count each of misdemeanor contempt (with like a thousand years of community service scrubbing some gang-banger's toilet at the Randolph County jail attached).

We'd also have to talk about one or more of Randolph County's oh-so-morally-grounded Republicans sponsoring a bill in the North Carolina legislature that modified the Medical Practice Act in a fashion that really protects (as opposed to the window dressing we have now) medical whistle-blowers.  Some modifications to the North Carolina "Non-Profit" Corporation Act - speaking directly to the accountablity of executives/their books to the public - is also in order.

I am nothing if not a reasonable girl.

Here at Housecalls, I've previously covered all of the reasons that Randolph County DA Garland Yates is a stagnant-Jabba-the-Hut-clone-in-dire-need-of-replacement, what with his nose corruptly and deeply buried up the recto-sigmoid colons of Asheboro's "right people" . . . . a number of those "right people" having served on the Boards of Directors of Randolph Hospital over the years . . . "right people" who think that paying "non-profit" CEO, Robert Morrison, over $700,000/year in salary and benefits (deferred or not) is reasonable, winkable and noddable while the rest of the town literally dies.

No big deal. We the wrong people are supposed to just roll over and get over it as we keep paying the bills that killed Asheboro.

What I really do not get is that with Governor Dumpling, NC Attorney General Roy Cooper and their many minions supposedly all over Medicaid fraud and abuse lately, and given how much cause I've given them/DHHS/the IRS to take a much closer look at Randolph Hospital's books, despicable methods and monopolistic business tactics (I'm not the only Pediatrician in Asheboro to have been treated very nastily over the years), I simply do not understand why Bob Morrison and Steven Eblin are still flying unchecked under the radar.

It's beyond frustrating.  You really have to wonder, WHAT EXACTLY DOES IT TAKE???

I mean, what do these two gentlemen have on someimportantbody somewhere, that they can get away with all they've gotten away with?

Meanwhile, over the years, I've had to listen to the high & mighties at the American Medical Association pontificate about "codes of ethics" that they cannot and do not enforce . . . and JCAHO talk out of both sides of its mouth - promoting patient safety while doing NOTHING to protect "disruptive" doctors who might blow the whistle on bad care (and appointing doctors with tainted credentials to important posts) . . . and the American Board of Pediatrics blow their horn about the importance of Board Certification (never mind that in real life the MBA's running many of our hospitals think that "Good Pediatricians are a dime a dozen") . . . and the North Carolina Medical Board boast about it's stellar record of transparency and accountability - when, in fact, they're almost always way-late to the party and do next-to-nothing when they get there.

And with apologies to the all-knowing, do-gooding Olson Huff, don't even get me started on President Obama's hallowed healthcare reform . . . a nearly one-thousand-page-arguably-un-Constitutional-pseudo-sociallist-mish-mash that did not even begin to address the real problems doctors are dealing with on the front lines of medicine . . . or much more importantly, HOW WE GOT WHERE WE ARE and WHAT WE MUST STOP DOING if we're going to survive as a nation.

(Glossed-over topics in the "debate" that produced PPHCA include burgeoning entitlements, illegal immigration, the malpractice crisis & tort reform, ineffectual medical peer review, ethics & accountability for the suits/third parties standing between patient and doctor, and real safeguards for medical whistle-blowers.) 

Just for "fun", and since this is a prelude to an announcement, let's review my CRIMINAL CASE against Randolph Hospital executives one more time (for the Cones and Robinsons in the local blogosphere who need everything to be in 100 words or less it's basically an even shorter version of these posts):

In late 1994, whilst working in New Orleans, I was recruited back home to Asheboro . . . to the hospital that had surgically mauled me as a child . . . under state (NC Office of Rural Health) and Federal (National Health Service Corps) agreements/contracts (loan repayment for service) . . . to work for a "non-profit" practice and "clean up" Pediatrics. 

I opened RMA Pediatrics' doors by myself/alone in the spring of 1995.

On top of staffing an office full-time (eventually with two other Peds arriving within months of one another), I took 24-7 back-up Pediatric and Neonatal critical-care call for ANYONE in town who asked for it.

I VOLUNTEERED to do this because given my own childhood medical misadventure, I took my service obligation . . . my "mission" if you will . . . very seriously . . . that, and I just gave a damn about providing decent medical care to kids in my hometown.

The NHSC agreement under which I labored specifically stated that appropriate peer review mechanisms had to be in place AND Randolph Hospital/its "controlled affiliate" could not interfere in any way with my continued practice in Asheboro (at the time, designated a medically under-served area) after my service obligation was completed.

Alas, over the next nearly three years RMA's President (and Randolph Hospital VP of Corporate Planning and Development) . . . the consummate, oily liar, Steven Eblin . . . managed to break every single promise he made in order to recruit me home.  Corners were cut, wards were closed. 

Pediatrics didn't make enough money fast enough to suit Steve.  In his world, if you recruited three Pediatricians to NOTHING (well, less-than-nothing given Randolph's awful reputation), they should be breaking-even in a year.

Increasingly, at the hospital, what I was being called in to "rescue" (or asked to overlook even as I was charged with fixing it) was becoming more problematic/dicey for me and my malpractice coverage.

Moreover, while the guys on staff could carry on their affairs, throw instruments, treat the nurses like crap, and drive drunk in their free time, if I so much as raised my voice about anything, well that made me "arrogant and cliquish" (translation: bitchy and "disruptive").

At the office, I was well-respected and the busiest of RMA's original three Pediatricians . . . with the best "patient mix" (ratio of insured/paying to uninsured patients) at the practice. I also took care of a number of medically-complicated children - the kids no one else wanted to touch.  I volunteered my services as a Child Medical Examiner (for child abuse exams) and served on Randolph County's Child Fatality Task Force.  I was also chair of the hospital's Perinatal Committee - charged to ensure quality care was delivered on the the LDRP unit.

It was a pressure-cooker.  But I loved my job.  I loved my life in Asheboro - living amongst friends and family - continuing a referral relationship with my alma mater.  I got along fantastically with one of my partners.

Unfortunately, behind the scenes, the Pediatric office was managed atrociously - by consultant-dependent businessmen with their two-year MBA's devoid of real people skills - who fancied themselves gods but seemed to have no clue what they were doing.  Eblin, in particular, seemed to think that he "owned" his employees . . . to the point of offering incentives for church-going (an offer I declined).

(Of course, in healthcare, a 2-year MBA trumps four years of medical school and three or more years of residency training every time.  As long as Bob Morrison gets his golden parachute, it doesn't matter how many doctors he drives out of town.)

It all finally came down to a new practice manager (who never even moved to Asheboro from Greensboro) threatening me with termination if I did not keep my mouth shut about problems at the office/hospital . . . his threat artfully crafted around a complaint filed by a local dentist who (speaking of bitchy) abused her "power" as a member of the Randolph County Board of Health in order to pursue a personal vendetta that was all about one-upmanship and revenge - as opposed to a doctor doing what was best/clinically indicated for her child.

Two days after the Director put his threat in writing (along the lines of "shut up or else"), I was forced to choose between my job and a critically-ill baby's life (said infant''s care being botched by a Moses Cone-owned FP who fancied himself a Neonatologist - and whose special skills in caring for sick babies were falsely advertised to an unsuspecting public by the marketing geniuses at Randolph Hospital).

Since I am a DOCTOR, after all, I chose to help the baby . . . naively/stupidly assuming that the hospital/state/Federal government had mechanisms in place to protect me from retaliation for doing my job the way it was supposed to be done.

I could not have been more wrong.

Two weeks after defying threats in order to save a patient's life - and subsequently reporting what happened to hospital peer review (as was my DUTY) . . . I was suddenly out of a job . . . muzzled and thrown out on the street like so much trash - in a Machiavellian fashion that breached every contract I ever signed with Randolph Hospital, RMA or the state/Federal governments. Everything I had worked so hard to build was destroyed or stolen by thus-far state-sanctioned lies and subterfuge.

Meanwhile, a whole lot of supposedly good men on the medical staff and hospital Board of Directors stood around and did NOTHING to stop it.

There were NO safety nets available to this Pediatrician under the Clinton/Hunt/Sleazely administrations.

Almost thirteen years later, Obama-loving Olson Huff's precious healthcare reform act has not fixed that.

The rest is history. North Carolina's systems of medical and legal oversight were deaf, dumb and blind in the face of the following:

Despite the REQUIREMENTS of my loan-repayment-for-service agreement with the National Health Service Corps, I got ZERO due process, and was left with no good recourse when RMA fired me and spent the next six months lying to everyone about what they had done (that's mostly because employment laws in North Carolina SUCK for everybody . . . especially doctors, who even with all of their special duties and ethical obligations, might as well be one of "Evil Keith's" night janitors at Asheboro Elastics).

Likewise, my hospital privileges, a legally protected property right, were also revoked without due process . . . in clear retaliation for filing my lawsuit against RMA a year after I was fired.  A staff resignation I had reconsidered and rescinded before its effective date was "accepted" without notifying me. The hospital's lawyer didn't want me on staff as I sued the hospital. And the Medical Executive Committee and Board of Directors were oblivious to the ramifications.

After the lawsuit was filed, I watched incredulously as "non-profit" hospital executives illegally plundered hospital peer review records . . . and used confidential/inadmissible documents I authored solely for purposes of internal and Medical Board review to their own ends - filing them on-the record in discovery!?!

That alone should scare the hell out of anyone on the medical staff at Randolph Hospital - and it should have gotten Bob Morrison and Steven Eblin fired long ago.  Anywhere else it would have been a massive breach of confidentiality, privacy and trust.  But not in Asheboro.

A year after I filed my lawsuit against RMA, I was SLAPP-sued by the "parent company" for "libel" - for writing a letter telling the state and Federal governments I had served the truth about what happened.  It was one of the most traumatic things that has ever happened to me.  Of course, I got ZERO assistance from the government that actually took negative action against Randolph because of what was in the complaint I submitted.

For when it came to lending a hand to the Pediatrician who put her life and future all on the line for a patient, the government-regulatory types all dived under their desks. 

(Ergo, it will be a very cold day in Hell before I buy into Dr. Huff's basic premise that the Federal government can or will save healthcare - particularly if it continues to indulge entitlements.)

Over at the Courier Tribune, David Renfro and Ray Criscoe could not resist plastering the headline that I was a liar all over the front pages of their so-called newspaper.  The Courier's motto seemed to be, "Anything to keep the people who pay for the ads happy."

But as bad as getting sued for "libel" was, the piece-de-resistance was getting SWINDLED of just restitution for all of the CRAP I and my family endured courtesy of Randolph Hospital . . . by in-your-face perjury, contempt and fraud . . . committed by people who fancy themselves above the law.

Of course, they're not that wrong.  My very basic civil rights have been repeatedly trampled - and justice obstructed - because for over seven years, Garland Yates has refused to even conduct an investigation, or refer the case to the North Carolina Attorney General (who should have fixed the gaping holes victims of crime and the falsely-accused can fall through after the Duke-Nifong debacle). 

The Randolph County DA's office has treated me as if I do not exist. 

Try it sometime.  See how you like it.

So I've got to reiterate to my friend's well-connected acquaintance that there's good reason the allegations are "unproven" . . .

. . . NO ONE HAS BOTHERED TO LOOK AT THE EVIDENCE.

(I'd actually have been better off if I'd been mugged on Asheboro's increasingly crime-ridden streets - at least a magistrate would have let me swear out a complaint.)

And/so dear readers, as a Pediatrician royally screwed over in one of Dr. Huff's sacred-cow public service programs . . . as a Pediatrician who has walked the walk and talked the talk in the ruralist of rural North Carolina (often laboring as the only Pediatrician admitting patients to the hospital for a several county radius) . . . as a Pediatrician who, as a locum tenens, has also worked in the small-town clinics and the big-city ER's in five different states . . . as a Pediatrician who has taken care of the medically-complex children in very challenging/vexing circumstances . . . as a Pediatrician who believes, based on her experience over the last nearly seventeen years, that access to medical care for children in North Carolina has gotten WORSE, not better . . . as a Pediatrician who has repeatedly fallen on her sword to help very sick children in real-life situations where seconds counted . . . as a Pediatrician who has been treated like dirt by our legal system . . . as a Pediatrician who is worth far more than "a dime a dozen" . . . I've got NO USE for Dr. Olson Huff's partisan puffing in an academic - or really any other - setting.

And that's mostly because Dr. Olson Huff is one of those doctors in the "right" North Carolina medical circles who has ignored my story and my plight for going on thirteen years.

Dr. Huff and his kind could have helped. But they didn't.  No Sirree.  It was far easier to keep "crazy" ole' me demoralized and defamed on the margins, and let local bloggers like Ed Cone-of-the-Moses-Cone-Healthcare-System-Cones and Roch Smith, Jr. and Jeff Martin have their fun . . . while "reporters" like John Robinson and Lex Alexander and Ray Criscoe made pathetic, lame excuses to look the other way.

(And the "reporters" wonder why their profession is in a nose-dive and their newspapers are tanking?!?)

I've got to ask, if doctors like me do not matter . . . if no one cares about what happens to us and to our dreams after we work so hard to achieve them . . . if our stories-of-woe are not deemed "relevant" to what is wrong with medicine . . . what makes any of these do-gooding social geniuses think that patients are going to fare any better?

A recent conversation (about our job security in a world where "freedom" means anything goes and no one is repsonsible for anything) with my good well-named buddy, Buzz Armfield, underscored all of my philosophical/political differences with the liberal academic Pediatric elite (like Huff . . . like the ABP's H. James Brown before him . . . like many of my ex-professors at the Mecca).  They all wallow in their accolades, and float high above the refuse that many children’s lives have become – because of very bad public policy that doesn’t just subsidize, but REWARDS all manner of bad behavior . . .  concentrating “only” (they say) on the immediate best needs of the children.  But how can they serve the best needs of children if they’re not willing to get their hands dirty and talk about how and why we got where we are?

The decision was made over the holidays, folks.  My family, friends and I have had enough.  After five years in this blogosphere, it's clear no one is going to do the right thing until they are forced to do the right thing . . . and the local newspapers sold their souls long ago.  As of this week, blogging is going on the back-burner (I will put up a post occasionally - say, like when John Edwards is indicted - or marries Reille - or decides to market the sex tape in order to pay his legal fees), and Dr. Mary Johnson is going to formally chatting up the lawyers.

For the record, just so everybody is crystal clear, I'm coming after Morrison and Eblin . . . and the "non-profit" hospital that circled its wagons around them . . . if I have to sue EVERY SINGLE ONE of the regulatory agencies that have determinedly pretended all of this never happened . . .  institutions-charged-with-the-public-good that negligently sat on sidelines and condoned every malice-soaked, despicable, amoral, unethical, illegal thing these two liars did to a good doctor for doing her job. 

I am determined to MAKE the law work the way it was supposed to work.  I cared enough about the law to go to Court in Asheboro, North Carolina.  And just like it mattered when Sleazely lied about his campaign finances and "Johnny Reid" lied about . . . well . . . everything, it is supposed to MATTER when "non-profit" executives brazenly walk in and negotiate a "deal" on a pack of lies - in order to get what they wanted as opposed to what they deserved.

I have not decided yet if I am going to blog what I do in the legal arena as I do it (ala dear departed Flea), but it's certainly a possibility.  Being "outed" (what has sank or holds back so many medical bloggers) is not a problem.  I've blogged under my own name for five years.

And, if the 112th Congress is really going to reform the 111th's reforms, I might as well throw my hat into that ring as well:  Medical whistle-blowers SIMPLY MUST have better protections and safe harbor from the wolves & sharks with MBA's & JD's.

So again, to the well-connected-lady-from-Asheboro-spewing-the-Schmidlyisms (someone I'm very generously declining to name on this blog), I'm saying right here and right now, It ain't "ancient history", sister.

It's here and it's now. 

Dr. Mary, you see, NEVER was "crazy".  She was right all along.  And she's ready to rumble.


All truth goes through three steps.  First it is ridiculed.  Second, it is violently opposed.  Third, it is accepted as self-evident.   - Arthur Schopenhauer

1/9 Update:  In terms of medical journalism in the mainstream media, I'm thinking that Sanjay Gupta is a number of years too late to this party.  And children died. 

And where were the Huffsters?