Maryland Board of Physicians: A Scathing Legislative Audit

Maryland Board of Physicians: A scathing legislative audit

Maryland’s Legislature recently released an audit of the Maryland Board of Physicians that casts a very negative light on this administrative entity. Embedded in its 161 pages are findings that many of us already knew, but now have been confirmed by the state’s legislative branch. Some of the more egregious findings are; the Board circumvented and or ignored Maryland law and Mandate when prosecuting cases against physicians, physician due process rights were abbreviated and or denied to them, hearings before the Board were denied, access to exculpatory documents were denied, time limits to bring cases were ignored or arbitrarily established, the Board failed to promulgate rules of medical record review leaving these rules to be established by private entities, engaging physicians with questionable competence to perform reviews, completely reversing the findings of administrative reviews from the Office of Administrative Hearings without stating why, deliberately misinterpreting written law to bring inadequate and or false cases against physicians, failure to provide proper communications between itself and the physician population and hundreds of more citations. The Maryland Board of Physicians is reactive not proactive. Many activities by politically active physicians are ignored, to churn those who are not well connected or part of a large institution. A dozen articles, by this author, are available in the Baltimore Examiner archive under my name that detail the horrific activities of this rogue entity and those who support its outrageous circumvention of Maryland law. After they were published I received numerous emails from physicians in Maryland and beyond its borders noting activities that were unbecoming from these politically appointed boards. In Maryland physicians presenting themselves to the Courts will find a very unfriendly atmosphere before the bench. Facts, documents, transcripts and other pieces of evidence have no meaning to many judges who will find for the state in most cases. The Court of Special Appeals will not only rule against a physician when the lower Court questions the Board’s activities, they will not allow you to be present in their Court House when considering a case. Perhaps Maryland Physicians should file a CLASS ACTION SUIT against the Maryland Board of Physicians because it appears the Legislature will not act against them, even in the face of the report they generated. Those who will have standing are all the physicians who careers were interrupted by the Board. Utilizing the cry their activities are for the public good is nothing less than a Machiavellian. The findings by the Maryland Legislature indicate it is the Board that needs to be decertified and those members, representatives and administrators of the Board who harmed physicians and their patients be stripped of their state immunity and sued. Catastrophic results by the Board’s action could leave Maryland with a dearth of American trained physicians, who will find calmer environs to practice the fine arts of a field that takes more than a decade to prepare. A copy of the Sunset Review of the Maryland Board of Physicians can be obtained from the Maryland Legislative Office. It is not online as of yet. In the event you want a copy and they will not release this report contact me at platomd@gmail.com.  This is one report that cannot be white washed. Mark Davis, MD President of Healthnets Review Service.