Minnesota was the least-effective state when it came to disciplining physicians, and, for the third-straight year, Alaska was the most effective, according to the annual ranking of serious disciplinary actions taken by state medical boards compiled by the Public Citizen Health Research Group.
Public Citizen creates the rankings by taking a three-year average of the data on medical license revocations, surrenders, suspensions, probations and suspensions compiled by the Federation of State Medical Boards and divides it by the states’ physician populations to come up with a “serious actions per 1,000 physicians” rating. The District of Columbia is also included in the rankings.
Minnesota’s rating was 0.95 serious actions taken per 1,000 physicians, while Alaska had a rating of 6.54 serious actions per 1,000 physicians. What appeared to disturb Public Citizen the most, however, was the appearance of California and Florida near the bottom with ratings of 2.37 and 2.35 and rankings of 43rd and 44th, respectively. The report noted also how California dropped to that level after being ranked 22nd in 2003.
Nationally, there were 2,817 serious actions taken by the medical boards in 2008 against the nation’s 963,084 physicians, which Public Citizen calculates to be a 3.28 rating when the previous two years are taken into account for a three-year average.
Finishing just above Minnesota were South Carolina, with 1.23 serious actions per 1,000 physicians; then Wisconsin, 1.64; and Mississippi, 1.87.
After Alaska, came Kentucky, with a 5.87 rating, followed by Ohio, 5.33; and Arizona, 5.12.
“The overall national downward trend of serious disciplinary actions against physicians is troubling because it indicates many states are not living up to their obligations to protect patients from bad doctors,” said Sidney Wolfe, Public Citizen's acting president and director of its Health Research Group, in a news release. “State lawmakers must give serious attention to finding out why their states are failing to discipline doctors and then they need to take action—either legislatively or by applying pressure on medical boards. Otherwise, they will continue to allow doctors to endanger the lives and health of their residents because of inadequate discipline.”
