The private corporate management has degraded quality of health care.
Last February I was appointed, by the unanimous vote of the Marin Healthcare District Board, to fill Sylvia Siegel's place after she resigned. The present board selected me knowing that my position supported the majority belief that our Marin General Hospital has deteriorated very seriously under the corporate management to which it was illegally leased in 1985. After consulting many experts in hospital management, I am confidant that a salaried professional management team responsible to the publicly elected District board can restore the high quality of care which Marin had before 1985 and which we all surely deserve and cherish.
The lease of 1985 was illegal due to conflict of interest of those who wrote it while employed by the District and then took the lease as a new corporation, giving themselves the $11,000,000 in cash on hand at MGH. Former supervisor Gary Giacomini called it the largest theft of public property in Marin history.
The California Court of Appeals will soon rule, for the 17th time, that the statute of limitations does not protect those who steal public property.
The deterioration of MGH under the lease has been dreadful: In 1995 the national Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO) scored MGH in the lowest 5% of all surveyed hospitals (over 4000 that year).
MGH drastically reduced registered nurse and other licensed staff ratios.
MGH patient outcomes are not excellent as shown in the national health evaluation website <http://www.healthgrades.com>.
The California Department of Health Services has cited Sutter/MGH for violating 135 state or federal laws or regulations.
Professional staff who brought violations to the attention of the District and/or State regulators have been harassed, reprimanded, fired, transferred, and sued by Sutter/MGH.
Sutter/MGH paid a $27,000 fine for falsely advertising itself as among the best hospitals.
A law suit will soon be decided by the courts which we expect to invalidate the 1985 lease, return the hospital and a substantial financial package to public control. I have joined the current chair Dr. Diana De Angelis Parnell and candidate Esther Blau RN in supporting this suit and its outcome. Parnell, Blau and Severinghaus are the PBS candidates, PBS being both our initials and the Public Board Slate.
This plan is also supported by current District Board Director Dr. Lawrence Arnstein, the Marin neurosurgeon elected to the board 2 years ago.
We PBS candidates and Dr. Arnstein propose to establish at MGH a trauma center with a trauma team available at all times and a stroke center.
The Sutter/MGH Corporation hope to elect their supporters and terminate the effort of the District to invalidate their lease.
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