SACRAMENTO — Arguing for doctors' privacy rights, the state's most powerful organization of physicians is trying to stop a month-old California Medical Board policy that allows patients access to a broad array of information about doctors.
The California Medical Assn. went to court last week seeking a permanent injunction against the new policy.
It contends that the board made two mistakes in implementing the policy: First, it failed to follow the state's formal procedures for making rules and, second, it violated the state Constitution's privacy law by reporting about cases turned over to the state attorney general's office for possible disciplinary action.
A hearing on the CMA's request has been scheduled for Nov. 24 in Sacramento Superior Court.
Under the new disclosure policy, the medical board for the first time will tell consumers more than just the status of a physician's license or whether the doctor faces disciplinary charges.
The new policy allows the agency to reveal whether a doctor has ever been convicted of a felony or disciplined by California or any other state or whether a physician has been subject to malpractice judgments over $30,000.
The most controversial provision in the policy--and one that consumer advocates say is the most important--allows the agency to disclose when it has recommended the filing of disciplinary charges against a doctor with the attorney general's office.
In the past, the agency only disclosed such information when the attorney general decided to file a formal accusation.
The CMA lawsuit has touched off a bitter exchange with consumer groups, which for years have been seeking broader disclosure of information about physicians. The CMA represents 33,000 of the state's 76,841 licensed doctors.
Consumer advocates accuse the CMA of trying to scuttle one of the nation's most liberal physician disclosure policies and of discouraging other states from copying California's policy.
"California is very much at the forefront among the states in terms of public disclosure and the CMA is trying to move it backward. It is acting like a grubby trade association, protecting the doctors, and the patients be damned," said Dr. Sidney Wolfe, director of the Washington-based Public Citizen's Health Research Group.
