Although the federal government now has a national database listing
incompetent care givers who have been disciplined in any of the fifty
states, this database is not complete and thousands of serious
disciplinary actions against health care providers are missing according
to a February 15, 2010 article in the Los Angeles Times.
The purpose of having a national database is to insure that incompetent
care givers who have been disciplined cannot move to another state and
obtain a job as a care giver without the new prospective employer
finding out about the disciplinary action. Before this national database
was created, the problem was that when care givers were disciplined in a
particular state, then other states could not gain access to the
disciplinary record. The federal government prepared a national database
which allows hospitals from all states to check the disciplinary record
of care givers, nurses, and other licensed healthcare professionals.
In a February 15, 2010 article in the Los Angeles Times it was reported
that this federal database was incomplete and was missing important
information about disciplinary actions against care givers. “Some of
the missing cases involve providers who have harmed patients…a nurse
whose license was pulled after she injected a patient with painkillers
in a drugstore parking lot…” (Los Angeles Times, 1). The data was
supposed to be obtained from state licensing board websites and was to
be complete. However, according to this article, there is missing
information which the federal officials were not aware of. The Health
Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) admitted that certain data
is missing. Information which is on state websites never made it to the
national website. According to the LA Times article, the mistakes are
numerous.
Although the government has kept a national database for disciplinary
actions taken against doctors for 20 years, no such database existed
until recently for other healthcare providers or care givers. Now that
the database exists, apparently massive information is missing and has
not been included on the national website. Although we have moved in the
right direction by establishing a national website, the fact that it is
incomplete is almost worse because now prospective employers will check
the website and believe that they have done their due diligence when, in
fact, they have not obtained all the correct and complete information.
“With an incomplete database…employers could be given ‘a false
sense of security that somebody who may be really dangerous isn’t,
because their name isn’t there’” (Los Angeles Times 2).
The federal government should make this a priority-it is very important
that prospective employers of nurses and care givers who have been
disciplined in a particular state obtain this information before they
make their hiring decisions.
Weber, Tracy and Charles Ornstein. The Los Angeles Times. February 15,
2010. www.latimes.com/news
