Here’s the payoff to last night’s teaser post about Parker Griffith and his history with Huntsville Hospital…

Here is the document detailing serious accusations of questionable treatment of patients at Huntsville Hospital during Dr. Parker Griffith’s time there.  You really have to read the document in it’s entirety to realize just how damning it really is.

Here are just a few quotes that give you the flavor of the findings:

  • “…there have been numerous irregularities existing in he treatment of patients in the radiation oncology program for some time.”
  • patients “have had sub-therapeutic and prolonged radiation therapy programs which have led to unwarranted pain and suffering.”
  • patients “have had sub-optimal radiation therapy leading to sub-optimal potentials for cure rates.”
  • “…inadequate medical supervision…”
  • “These various concerns [were] supported by numerous letters and documentation.”
  • “…in those patients managed by [Dr. Griffith] there was a definite emphasis toward limited volumes inappropriate to the disease being treated, fractionation schedules which are much lower than our standard in most departments in the United States, and total doses that were inadequate…”
  • “…more aggressive programs of management would have resulted in cure.”
  • “…the best one can say is that it was treatment designed to insure recurrence of the patient’s disease process which indeed occurred…”
  • “…large numbers of patients in hospital on which there was poor record keeping and documentation…”
  • “…the records…were poorly managed and poorly maintained.”
  • “The rationale for the dose/time schedules used is not stated in any of the records and I personally don’t understand the reasons behind it.”

One of the themes that the reader is led to believe, although is not stated directly, is that Griffith may have intentionally prolonged treatment programs, which would result in additional billing.  Also, the allegations in the report do not reflect isolated cases, they indicate a systemic pattern of irregular treatment.

The report also includes a summary of treatments and details on what percentage were adequate.  It isn’t pretty.

Reactionary had a nice post about the credentials of the report’s authors.

The document raises as many questions as it answers.  If the findings in the report are accurate and verifiable then why did Huntsville Hospital stop at voting to revoke his privileges?  It seems like all of that “sub-optimal” treatment should have been reported to a board of licensure at a minimum.  Why was Dr. Griffith so foolish as to proudly and unequivocally dismiss Wayne Parker’s vague allegations of possible misconduct at Huntsville Hospital?  He was certainly smug as he told WHNT’s Greg Privett that the issue was simply one of Huntsville Hospital viewing him as a competitor.  How will Griffith respond to this new information?

The answer to the question about Griffith’s foolish pride may lie in Griffith’s history as a politician.  Since 2004 he has made it through two high profile campaigns without this information coming out (Huntsville mayoral race in 2004 and AL state senate in 2006).  I know that in 2004 there were whispers about misconduct, but nothing like this came out.  I don’t recall any mention of his history as a doctor in 2006, although I don’t live in his district and didn’t follow that race terribly closely.  Maybe he assumed he could make it through another campaign by not telling the truth.

It is interesting to note one of Griffith’s significant business interests: he owns (I believe) 13 funeral homes.  While I certainly don’t think or mean to suggest that he intentionally gave patients sub-standard coverage or that he even owned the funeral homes during this time period (I don’t know), it does present a curious conflict of interests.  It sounds a lot like vertical integration.

And kudos to Wayne Parker’s campaign.  They just schooled us all in how to play rope a dope.  They put out a vague, provocative ad and Griffith took the bait hook, line, and sinker.  There were questions as to whether they really knew something or were just making waves.  It now appears that they did know something - something quite damning.  They let Griffith play out the line and now the hook has been set.

The ball is now in Dr. Griffith’s court.  I anticipate seeing advertisements hammering Griffith on this point - and rightly so.  The new information goes directly to the issue of trust on a number of levels.  The main stream media will pick up on this soon.  Griffith will be forced to respond and after being caught lying to the media once on this issue I don’t suspect they will be so willing to simply accept his claims.

Other links (so far) on the story:

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This entry was posted by Brian on Tuesday, September 23rd, 2008 at 9:02 pm and is filed under AL-05 Congressional Race, Ethics Scandals. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site. Please note the copyright policy.