I agree wholeheartedly. While everybody is entitled to make mistakes, when it comes to your health and possibly your life, there has to be some kind of a lines drawn.
A group of Canadian researchers have been tracking doctors in this country and they say a national database is needed to make it easier for patients to be "in the know" when it comes to whose services they seek when they need professional, medical care and I say, why not?
The group is focusing their research on doctors who have been disciplined for one reason or another.
"From a national perspective, I don't know if there is that transparency we need," says one physician involved with the ongoing effort. "If a doctor who is disciplined in Alberta comes to Ontario is that reported? I don't know," he adds.
Depending on what the discipline was for, this could be kind of frightening if you are a trusting patient.
The study's authors say that while provincial colleges are mandated to record and disclose information, there is little uniformity in data collection and reporting.
"It would be great to have something national, to benchmark your province with, or to track doctors in other provinces," adds the physician.
And it would. You wouldn't hire a mechanic with a bad reputation to work on your car, why would trust unqualified doctor with your own body?
According to the stats, at least 606 Canadian doctors have been disciplined between 2000 and 2009, yet the data on this is far from forthcoming. "This was really hard to do on a national basis, I don't know what a patient would do to get this information," says one doctor.
Researchers found most of the "disciplined" doctors were men and family physicians in practice for nearly 30 years. The most frequent violation was sexual misconduct (20 per cent) followed by standard of care issues (19 per cent). The study also found that 54 doctors committed repeat offences, including seven physicians who were disciplined three times and two physicians who were disciplined four times.
To me this is no different than any other profession - with the exception that in this case there's a real chance your life could be on the line. If you're not up to the job at hand then your customers, clients and/or patients have the right to know and to make an informed decision. We have the Better Business Bureau to look to for other professions, why can't we have the same for doctors?
