Kaiser Permanente

The administrator of Kaiser Permanente's Fresno hospital stepped down Monday, days after the release of a federal report that criticized the way the medical center responded to complaints about a doctor who handled high-risk pregnancies. In a written statement released late Monday, Kaiser said Fresno hospital administrator Susan Ryan had resigned, effective immediately. Last week, the U.S.

Kaiser Permanente has suspended a physician who handled high-risk pregnancies at its Fresno hospital, more than four months after the Los Angeles Times reported that doctors and nurses there had repeatedly questioned his competence. In a statement released late Friday, interim hospital Administrator Linda Monte said that, effective immediately, perinatologist Hamid Safari would not be able to provide care to any Kaiser member in a hospital or outpatient setting.

Patients treated at Kaiser Permanente hospitals in Southern California were less satisfied than many of those at other hospitals in the region and across the country, according to data released Friday from the first nationwide satisfaction survey. None of the 10 Kaiser hospitals in Southern California that participated in the survey exceeded the regional average when patients were asked if they would "definitely recommend" the hospital to friends and family.

About 3,400 Californians whose health insurance was canceled by Kaiser, Health Net and PacifiCare after they got sick will soon receive notification that they may be eligible for new coverage and for compensation for medical bills they paid while they were uninsured. In a deal with state regulators, the insurers agreed to offer former members new coverage regardless of preexisting medical conditions and to reimburse them for medical expenses.

Kaiser Permanente got a perfect four stars for medical care on an annual HMO score card that California officials hope consumers will use to shop for health coverage. The state's largest health maintenance organization consistently comes out on top in the 8-year-old survey, but it was the first time that any HMO had scored a four-star rating.

A Los Angeles jury has ordered Kaiser Permanente to pay a former radiologist $3.9 million for wrongfully forcing him to resign after he tried to improve medical standards at its Hollywood hospital. The decision involving Dr. Michael Martinucci was announced Monday in Los Angeles County Superior Court.

A former employee has sued Kaiser Permanente, claiming that the HMO "blackballed" her for participating in a criminal investigation into the alleged dumping of a homeless woman on skid row. Irene Hernandez, 50, of Downey said Kaiser's hospital in Bellflower quit employing her as a registry nursing assistant after she cooperated with the Los Angeles city attorney's office investigation into alleged patient-dumping by the hospital giant.

Kaiser Permanente's $4-billion effort to computerize the medical records of its 8.6 million members has encountered repeated technical problems, leading to potentially dangerous incidents such as patients listed in the wrong beds, according to Kaiser documents and current and former employees.

UC San Francisco has taken over a post-transplant clinic for kidney patients at Kaiser Permanente's San Francisco hospital, bringing to an end Kaiser's brief -- and scandal-plagued -- foray into the organ transplant business. The takeover means that UC doctors now will care for Kaiser's kidney transplant patients before, during and after their surgeries. Kaiser had been caring for about 1,500 patients who had already received transplants. "This is the last piece of the puzzle," said Dr.

The senior executive overseeing Kaiser Permanente's massive effort to digitize its members' medical records is being replaced, the company said Monday, the latest sign of turmoil for the $4-billion project, one of the nation's largest. The departure of Bruce Turkstra, interim chief information officer, comes just four months after he was tapped to replace the health maintenance organization's previous CIO, J. Clifford Dodd.