200 San Diego Kaiser Workers Strike for Fourth Time

I am personally familiar with Mary Ann Barnes' level of honesty. She supported the actions described here.

200 Local Kaiser Workers Strike for Fourth Time
24-hour strike aims to protect health care and retirement benefits
By Lauren Steussy
Jan 31, 2012
NBCSanDiego

Over 200 Kaiser workers went on strike Tuesday.

Workers at Kaiser Permanente are lining up in front of facilities across California to bring awareness to contract disputes with Kaiser's mental health and optical employees.

Statewide, 4,000 National Union of Healthcare Workers (NUHW) employees will strike for 24-hours Tuesday. It is expected to be one of the biggest strikes in Kaiser's history, since two other unions will also walk out.

The disputes center around proposed cuts to retirement and health care benefits.
Over 200 of those NUHW employees work in San Diego. It's the group's fourth walkout since contract negotiations began in 2010. The most recent one since Tuesday's was in September.

Workers on strike say Kaiser's disputes affect not only their own health care and benefits, but also patient care.

"We've worked hard to make Kaiser successful," said Sarah Eberst, a Lincensed Clinical Social Worker with NUHW, "but we don't want that to come at the cost of pateint care or at the cost of our own retirement benefits or healthcare."

In April, Kaiser sent an economic proposal back to the unions, which have not negotiated since, according to MaryAnn Barnes, Senior Vice President and Executive Director Health Plan and Hospital for Kaiser in San Diego.

"We're very disappointed, and we need to see movement in the negotiations," Barnes said. "We're willing to negotiate in good faith, but we are not getting the same kind of reaction from NUHW."

All Kaiser hospitals and medical offices are expected to remain open during the strike, with Kaiser relying on replacement workers and nurse managers for additional staffing. This is possible because a very small group of the workers are actually on strike today, Barnes said.

"When Kaiser is making billions of dollars of profit per year," Eberst said, "It's not okay to be cutting back on employees retirement and health care."


Source: 200 Local Kaiser Workers Strike for Fourth Time | NBC San Diego

My doctor said I was paranoid to doubt medical report--but I was proved right

My primary care doctor, Jae Kyo Lee of Kaiser Permanente in San Diego, said that I was paranoid when I didn't believe that a medical report could be signed three days before it was written. It turned out I was right. My urologist, Dr. Huathin Khaw, had supposedly co-signed a report on June 17, 2011. The report had supposedly been written by Dr. Jay Grimaldi on June 20, 2011. I was also suspicious because the date of the X-ray procedure was wrong and the name of the referring doctor was wrong.

It turned out I was right. The original report had actually been written on June 16, 2011 by a completely different doctor. That's the report Dr. Khaw co-signed. Then somehow large parts of it got erased. NONE of my digitized X-rays were ever made available on the Kaiser server--not even Emergency Room doctor could see them.

Dr. Jae Kyo Lee and Dr. Eugene Rhee told me I should accept the report "because it had my name on it." Why would they both make the same bizarre statement? They must be trained to say that when documents are obviously compromised.

Dave Horton, who is in charge of Radiology and Radiology Files, has refused to respond to a letter and an email. His underlings obediently spout a ridiculous story about my X-rays, taken at the brand new Garfield Specialty Center, having been saved only on thermal paper. But Kaiser's own newsletter says all X-rays at the new center are digitized. Is Kaiser guilty of false advertising? I don't think so. I think they're guilty of covering up incorrect diagnoses.

My digitized X-rays remain "unavailable". Why the cover-up, guys? (Well, I shouldn't say "guys" since Lynette Seid and Mary Ann Barnes have supported the cover-up.) I'd say these folks are a bit paranoid if they're afraid of a few X-rays.

Is Kaiser Permanente violating the California Business and Professions Code with false advertising about digitized x-rays?

Kaiser Permanente boasts about its new Garfield Specialty Center in its October 2011 e-newsletter: "All our X-rays and imaging tests are digital and become part of your electronic health record, which can help speed diagnosis and treatment."

But Kaiser Member Services wrote to me on August 3, 2011 that x-rays taken on June 15, 2011 at the Garfield Specialty Center were not available to my urologist or to Emergency Room doctors because they were saved only on thermal paper! No images at all were available to Emergency Room doctors.

Kaiser wrote:
"Per our records I understand that you spoke with...the X-ray Department on July 11, 2011 where it was explained that the urethra cystogram could not be downloaded to a CD due to it was not digitized. Urethra cystogram was not saved electronically and
we can provide medical record on thermal paper."

(Click on image to enlarge.)


Which is it, Kaiser? Are all x-rays at Garfield Specialty Center digitized, or did Kaiser move some old machines into the new building, and those machines can only save x-rays on thermal paper? Obviously, both claims can not be true.

Kaiser tampered with medical records and created a bizarre series of paper images to hide x-rays. Kaiser was determined to prove that the patient did not have the problem she claimed to have. This plan was written down by the referring doctor in an email to the Department Administrator before the procedure was done. I have written to Dave Horton and Rhianne Steins, who head the Diagnositic Imaging Department, but I've received no response. Chief Financial Officer Lynette Seid was kind enough to respond to me, but she admits she doesn't know much about the issue, and says it will take her two to four weeks to sort it out. And as one can see from the above image, Liza Zinola, Service Area Assistant Administrator for Member Services, is actively supporting the cover-up.

What possessed some Kaiser administrator to plan such an incompetent hoax? I think they are used to having patients who ask no questions.

Here's the Kaiser article:

Garfield Specialty Center in full bloom
Partners in Health e-newsletter
October 2011

If you live near Central San Diego, you’ll be happy to hear that our Garfield Specialty Center is now fully open for business.

Our Garfield Specialty Center “offers a convenient, central location for members to receive same-day surgery and medical care from 58 specialty care providers,” says Mary Ann Barnes, senior vice president and executive director of Kaiser Permanente in San Diego.

(Click on image to enlarge.)



The Ambulatory Surgery Center has four operating suites, six gastrointestinal procedure suites, and pre- and post-operative patient care areas. Other services available include:

orthopedics
podiatry
pain management
plastic surgery
general surgery
head and neck surgery
audiology
gastroenterology
urology
pharmacy
laboratory
radiology

All our X-rays and imaging tests are digital and become part of your electronic health record, which can help speed diagnosis and treatment. In our laboratory, full-spin, adjustable chairs enable technicians to draw blood from either arm. Exam rooms are built for greater noise reduction and patient privacy.

“We’ve designed this building with a lot of windows and natural light,” says Barnes. “Our designers paid close attention to creating a comfortable, healing environment for our patients.”

The Garfield Specialty Center is at 5893 Copley Drive, about 8.5 miles from our San Diego Medical Center.