HealthGrades launches first physician malpractice database for the public

HealthGrades, the nation’s leading independent health care ratings company, has compiled the first national database of physician malpractice records available to the public. Detailed information on medical malpractice judgments, settlements and arbitration awards against physicians in 15 states - including New York - is now available on-line, at www.healthgrades.com, as part of HealthGrades’ physician quality reports for consumers.

The database combines, for the first time, all available public malpractice records. It also includes the amount or range of payment and whether the resolution was a judgment, settlement, or the result of arbitration. In HealthGrades’ data set, approximately three percent of physicians have a malpractice settlement or judgment on their record over the years 2001-2005. That number is likely higher as HealthGrades data is based on state records, some of which contain thresholds for reporting claims.

Most physicians who have experienced a malpractice judgment or settlement are still practicing without disciplinary action by a state medical board, a set of information already available in HealthGrades’ physician reports. Of the 35,000 doctors who have had two or more malpractice payouts since 1990, only 7.6 percent of them have been disciplined, and only 13 percent of doctors with five medical malpractice payouts have been disciplined, according to data from the National Practitioner Data Bank, a government malpractice database not available to the general public.

Yet, until now, the public has had only limited access to physician malpractice judgment and settlement data, primarily through the individual state agencies that report the information.

"Now consumers have access to all available physician malpractice information in one place, helping them identify doctors who may have trouble spots in their past -- even if the physician currently practices in a state where malpractice information is not publicly reported," said Sarah Loughran, HealthGrades executive vice president.

But challenges remain in increasing consumers’ access to physician malpractice records. For example, among the states that do report physician malpractice data, there is wide variation in how much information is provided, and how long it stays on a physician’s record.

"We commend the states that report this important information and we are pleased to provide this to the consumers searching for doctors using HealthGrades. But huge gaps in our knowledge of malpractice activity remain," Loughran said. "We encourage the 35 states that do not report malpractice data and the federal government to consider making this valuable information available to consumers."

HealthGrades has added malpractice data for physicians in the following states: California, Connecticut, Florida, Idaho, Indiana, Massachusetts, Maryland, North Dakota, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Tennessee, Virginia, Vermont and West Virginia.

In HealthGrades’ data set, the five medical specialties with the highest percentage of malpractice incidents are, in rank order: bariatric surgery, maternal fetal medicine, neurosurgery, obstetrics and gynecology, and cardiothoracic surgery.

The malpractice information is being added to what is already the most robust online resource for consumers researching physicians. The physician-quality reports that HealthGrades offers to consumers on nearly every practicing physician in the country – about 700,000 – contain data on their medical training, board certification, sanctions by medical boards in any of the 50 states, quality ratings of nearby hospitals, patient-satisfaction ratings and more.


Source: http://answersforlisa.blogspot.in/2007/03/doctors-records-go-online.html

Healthgrades Updates Their Hospital Scoring Algorithm–Hopefully the “Dead Doctors” and Errors Having Doctors o

Here we go again and I’m sure I don’t win any scoring points with the website since I have found discrepancies on their site as blogged on this site over the last couple of years.  It all started with me with finding my former doctor, who had been dead for 8 years still listed on their site and I’m sure some of the other issues have been fixed when they appear here as well:)  I’m not a big fan up front about some of the statistics we see out there today and more on that later in the post.

Even the AMA and myself had a little interview about that one, as I do try to keep folks aware of sources of flawed data we encounter on the web and it’s growing.  We knew marketing was going to improve at Healthgrades when they were merged with a marketing firm as why else would they merge?  The CEO of Healthgrades also joined the board of CPM marketing…and I guess since August they have hired their social media expert they were advertising for.  Here’s some back links for a little history.



I also said not too long ago that all these “doctor and hospital rating sites’ should entertain giving it up as the amount of flawed data increases out there as credible data is being combined with non-credible data and some of the results we are seeing are “incredibly flawed data” as when you bring in social network information and poll, etc. people can lie their fanny off.  Polls are usually done in an effort to somewhat sell you something anyway.  They bug me anyway on the web and not very often will I opt to participate as it all depends on who’s doing it, what the poll is and if I see any value and for about 95% what I see out there, there no value and a some are created just to scrape your data and sell it, so why bother.

Last time the report came out it nixed all the hospitals in the Boston area and we heard about that and rightly so.  It’s all about context and again what they are trying to sell you and thus I still maintain these rankings are useless as formulas, algorithms and math are in the hands of the creator.  I said earlier more on this and I’ll include one of my absolute favorite videos from Professor Siefe of NYU, who also wrote the book, “Proofiness, the Dark Arts of Mathematical Deception” and the points he made and a bit of what I say here is going to be growing importance in the near future as dirty code, code for profit, complex business plans that event he companies an banks that use them don’t understand, etc. are going to become more main stage.  It’s been going on for years and it’s time to again “look at the context” and see what message is really being relayed.  If you watch Charlie’s video, he’ll tell you and he’s a smarter than me and it’s eye opener to make you think and wonder if you have been “Algo Duped”. 

The public is not comfortable with math and thus you get duped.  People have a tendency to hold  quantitative mathematical formulas in high esteem he states even if it is all bogus.  Serious well trained researchers fall in here too.  We have a have a habit of finding quantitative as valuable, he says just look at the newspapers.  So again in reference to this grading system I’m with him and the same thoughts.  See the example he gives on the algorithm written to tell you how perfect your “butt” is…and boy does it get play <grin>.  How can there be a standard for the perfect butt…making sense yet?  Formulas become national news.  If it has a square root in the formula, oh it must be right…not <grin>. 

The media does not understand the formulas themselves and nor do they try to for the most part.  So am I holding my breath and anxiously awaiting this new ranking…no… like I said just give this stuff up.  A listing of doctors and hospitals with patient comments, etc. is fine but again the rakings with the amount of flawed data out there are like like a lot of other things on the web are quickly becoming less valuable in nature and fewer people actually even have time for them…that’s reality as it is today. 

I have a series called the Attack of the Killer Algorithms that addresses analytics and their scoring so you can look beyond just this issue and see everyday examples.  Predictive analytics too is an area that is just ripe for abuse as well as most of the data is evaluating trending information but again you have a lot of combinations of both credible and non credible data presented in a lot of this and it’s hard to distinguish the difference with methodologies of presentation today.  BD

Quality of care at 4,500 U.S. hospitals is being sliced, diced, scrutinized, and ranked yet again with a new and significantly expanded quality ranking system from Healthgrades .
This time the Denver-based company, which has provided quality information about healthcare providers for 14 years, offers state-by-state analysis online for up to 28 types of care, 13 safety measures, and five-year trends for four conditions.

After applying its algorithms to the data, Healthgrades gives hospitals one, three, or five gold stars on up to 28 types of care—from appendectomy to pulmonary embolism to valve repair—to indicate whether patient outcomes of were worse than expected, as expected, or better than expected.


Source: http://www.wellsphere.com/healthcare-industry-policy-article/healthgrades-updates-their-hospital-scoring-algorithm-8211-hopefully-the-8220-dead-doctors-8221-and-errors-having-doctors-o/1770453

Using HealthGrades to Choose a Doctor?

HealthGrades is an online ratings system for healthcare providers that allow patients access to their doctors’ profile pages and ratings from other patients. The idea behind HealthGrades is to provide consumers with research tools to make informed healthcare choices while, at the same time, providing a marketing tool for doctors.

The recognized doctor designation is based on methodology where the doctor is (vertabim):

    Free of a revoked, surrendered or suspended license, or a probationary status (since record keeping began in 2000)
    Free of federal or state sanctions (disciplinary actions) during the last five years
    Free of any monetary settlements, adverse arbitration awards, or malpractice judgments during the last five-years
    Board certified in practice specialty

Physicians complete their own HealthGrades profiles. Physician data is subsequently compiled through a number of private and public sources, then cross-matched against the profile. Quarterly updates are made to profiles, meaning if a disciplinary action surfaces it will post within three months of the final disposition. HealthGrades additionally gathers relevant board certification and medical malpractice information.
Use caution…

HealthGrades was founded in 1998 and now features over 900,000 online physician profiles. Patients who visit the HealthGrades website have the option of completing a survey that rates their physician. The identity and email address of surveyees is kept confidential. The downside is that there is no patient verification component to the survey process, so anyone can evaluate a doctor — patient or not. This means surveys can be completed for purposes of intentionally elevating or lowering a physician’s rating — perhaps by providing false information — thereby skewing the results relating to patient satisfaction.

While HealthGrades provide a valuable service with current information, it is not intended as a replacement methodology for doing your own homework. It is always important for patients to ask questions and to do their own research to get a better picture of whether the doctor they’re considering suits their needs.

Please contact a licensed attorney if you have been under the care of a physician who you suspect committed medical malpractice.

Source: http://www.trinjurylaw.com/2013/02/07/using-healthgrades-to-choose-a-doctor/

Flawed Data With Physician and Hospital Rating Sites

ImagePhysician and hospital rating websites are flawed. Indeed, the information is often so out-of-date that what little value these sites have to offer is completely gone.

I found my own doctor, who has been deceased for 8 years, still showing up on Vitals and HealthGrades

I have said a couple times the rating are unreliable. If UCLA and Boston Hospitals never seem to make the top of their listings, the rating systems aren't working. They are using some type of quantitative formula to crunch these numbers, but they aren't good formulas.

I have also said well just keep like a Yellow Page listing and they can’t get that right, either.

So, here’s the latest: Dr. Arnold Klein, once Michael Jackson's dermatologist, been in the news with a warrant out for his arrest in relation to his bankruptcy case. You can go to the links on both Vitals and HealthGrades sites and the doctor’s site has been down for a while. But there is a video about him is still up on Vitals. image

Yet, a few months ago there was an article stating that HealthGrades is seeing fewer reviews. I can see why. If the accuracy is failing, people won’t use it.

You can buy insurance off the Vitals site. A lot of this comes from the data selling epidemic that strangles the U.S. and stifles job growth as companies and banks just sell data instead of doing much in the tangible areas for revenue growth.

Physician Rating Sites Are Seeing Fewer Reviews These Days–Flawed Data Catching Up Along With Loss of Value As Consumers and Doctors Lose Interest?
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HealthGrades has put Dr. Arnold Klein on the Honor Roll and both sites still have him listed on staff at a couple hospitals. It obvious they don’t mine the news and have a small section to where they might update information like what we see on TV and on the web. I don’t know the doctor; this just suggests to me the lack of accuracy of these sites.

Dr. Arnold Klein made big national news. How many doctors hide from authorities living on a glacier?  You would think that with this amount of information made available to the public, HealthGrades and Vitals would take notice. Nope.

Nose Doctor on the Run Found Living in a Tent at the End of a Glacier in Italy, Admitted Fraud Still Listed on Some MD Referral Sites

I looked way back in my posts and found a 2009 blog post about Dr. Arnold Klein appearing on Larry King. 2009! Which makes it appear that it has been about 5 years since either sites updated their data.

A couple years back some doctors and I did some comparisons and we found all kinds of mistakes on sites like these, including doctors who were deceased, doctors listed at hospitals they had never set foot in, and so forth. It's totally bogus that these sites are make money by selling data and get advertising revenue, but want the doctors themselves to update the data. There are other services that doctors pay for, like ZocDoc. They are totally different because you can make appointments on ZocDoc and it’s a service the doctor wants, and thus they do update their own profiles there. Don’t confuse the two.

Last year in the news, it was announced that HealthGrades was joining the board of a company that does market research… huh?  Maybe not on doctors and hospitals, right?

HealthGrades CEO Founder Joins WorldOne Board–Flawed Data And Broken Algorithms On the Move to Advise Market Research? Algo Duping Society?

Anybody heard of Dr. Gary Michelson who won a couple billion from Medtronic years ago and retired? He does a lot of neat philanthropy work for dogs and human. Well, he’s on Vitals and HealthGrades still. I think he stopped practicing 8 years ago. Hopefully, while I’m writing this post and accessing their websites, Vitals and HealthGrades are catching my IP and scraping data.

The main point is the algorithms are not working very well. And I can’t blame the hospitals and doctors for being outraged

HealthGrades to Merge with CPM Marketing–Will Their Data and Questionable Algorithms Will Be Improved For Consumers? 



Hospitals like UCLA and Harvard sometimes received lower rating than one would expect, especially considering they offer specific procedures and treatments that no one else does. This is just wrong.

I’m very concerned about the buying and selling of data that nobody checks or fixes. The time has come to license and tax data sellers. We could use the revenue to fund the NIH and the FDA. This has become an epidemic in the US and it hurts consumers every day.

Source: http://healthworkscollective.com/barbaraduck/86331/flawed-data-physician-and-hospital-rating-sites