Lubbock mother accusing U.S. Army of medical malpractice, negligence in death of her son

[dimsum]

Recently, the Government of Accountability Office held a preliminary investigation by checking four random bases. It found that nearly one in six of the doctors did not have verified medical licenses before practicing and failed to document assessment requirements when treating someone.

Wow.

Lubbock mother accusing U.S. Army of medical malpractice, negligence in death of her son

A Lubbock mother is fighting the U.S. Army, who she claims did not treat her son’s head injury and left him alone to die for nearly six days.

www.kwtx.com

 

[Blackadder1916]

There's a wide delta between the information presented in the above linked KWTX report and its insinuation that inadequate credentialing/privileging played a part in "medical malpractice" in the tragic death of Pvt Smithers.

For background, this from last year in Army Times.

Sick paratrooper who died of infection was failed by leadership, investigation says

The actions of soldiers in her son’s unit and an Army hospital's failure to properly diagnose his injury leave a mother with unanswered questions.

www.armytimes.com

If the initial reaction was "Wow", then the additional details will be a WOW, WTF.

As to the GAO report about "nearly one in six of the doctors did not have verified medical licenses before practicing", what the report actually said was ". . . GAO reviewed credentialing and privileging procedures for 100 selected providers from four selected medical facilities. For about one-sixth of providers, the facilities did not adhere to the DHA requirement to verify all medical licenses before granting privileges. . . ."

As an example of what they mean by "all licenses", from the report

Active licenses. The documentation we reviewed for our sample of
providers shows that for about one-sixth of the selected providers, the
selected facilities did not adhere to the DHA requirement to verify all
medical licenses before granting privileges. For example, in one instance,
a provider had ten medical licenses but the facility only verified eight of
those licenses before granting privileges. In other instances, the facilities
could not provide documentation that they verified any licenses before
granting privileges to a provider.