Patient statement: Racism and elitism
By Michael K. Hicks | Sunday, March 22, 2009 | bostonherald.com | Local Coverage
Here is the text of the letter that injured patient Michael K. Hicks sent to the state and the NAACP after the Department of Public Health closed its probe of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center without interviewing him or another key witness against the hospital.
My name is Michael K. Hicks and on June 27, 2008, I had a liposuction and breast reduction procedure at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center by Dr. Loren Borud.
This is a high-profile case because of the allegations that Dr. Borud was impaired while doing my surgery.
The Department of Public Health conducted what they claimed to be a full investigation and cleared Beth Israel of any wrongdoing. However, the DPH did not interview Dr. Loren Borud, the lead plastic surgeon; they did not interview me the victim; nor did they interview Dr. Eran Bar-Meir, who is the fellow surgeon that put me back together the best way he knew how.
Also, my attorneys, Gorovitz and Borten, have approximately 15 hours of recorded sworn testimony (750 pages of documents) from the fellow, Dr. Bar-Meir, the plastic surgeon who completed two-thirds of my surgery, conveying that Dr. Loren Borud was on drugs and he fell a sleep twice during the surgery with the liposuction machine in my chest.
This has caused me to have horrible scars, no left nipple, physical and emotional pain and distress, and I feel a cover-up with racism at its highest level.
Paul Dreyer, the director of the Bureau of Health Care Safety at the Department of Public Health, wants the public to believe he reached his conclusion after a full investigation. I am not sure what the basis of his conclusion is and he has taken an elitist approach toward me. The Beth Israel Deaconess has also taken an elitist approach toward me. On Oct. 5, 2008, the Boston Herald published an article questioning the conclusion of the Department of Public Health. This is not only an incomplete investigation by the Department of Public Health but I believe racism at its highest level.
Three days after my surgery, another surgeon at Beth Israel Deaconess operated on a white woman on whom a wrong-side surgery (orthopedic surgery) occurred. Beth Israel Deaconess apologized to her immediately after she awoke from surgery. They even made the statement public and did everything right and respectfully for the white woman, and gave her dignity. In my case, they sent me home the same day of the surgery without a doctor even seeing me. What was different about Michael Hicks? I am African-American, and to Beth Israel I am a Negro. My life is worth absolutely nothing to them. It is apparent my civil rights are being violated by Paul Dreyer, Beth Israel Deaconess and the Department of Public Health.
I made the complaint to the Board of Registration in Medicine. I will commend the Board of Registration in Medicine for an outstanding job in its investigation into what happen on June 27, 2008. The Board of Registration interviewed me, Dr. Bar-Meir and many other individuals related to the case. The Board was absolutely flabbergasted about what this impaired doctor did to my body. The board promptly suspended Dr. Loren Borud’s license, and Beth Israel fired Dr. Loren Borud for what he did to me on June 27, 2008.
This has destroyed my life, my family’s life and has brought complete, utter turmoil in my life. Beth Israel has implemented a cover-up with a surgery that was supposed to last one hour and a half, and ended up lasting almost seven hours with a doctor on drugs sleeping while operating on me.
This case is being tried at Suffolk Superior Court. Michael Hicks, Plaintiff, vs. Dr. Loren Borud, MD, defendantand, eight other doctors, nurses and Beth Israel, Docket No. 08-3314A.
I am pleading for some help in reopening the investigation at the Department of Public Health. In addition, an investigation should be launched against the DPH. Paul Dreyer should be fired, as well as criminal charges should be filed against this individual. Once you do your research on this case I strongly feel you will understand how outrageous this case is, and has become, with racism involved and an elitist approach toward me and people being pressured or influenced to clear Beth Israel of any wrongdoing.
Thank you for your time on this urgent and pressing matter.
Respectfully speaking,
Michael K. Hicks
Quincy
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Doc: Lawyer advised him to skip town
By Jessica Fargen | Sunday, March 22, 2009 | bostonherald.com | Local Coverage
A lawyer for a former doctor at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center allegedly informed the doctor that he could avoid being served in a major malpractice case if he left the country, according to sworn testimony by the surgeon.
In a 754-page deposition, former Beth Israel surgical fellow Dr. Eran Bar-Meir, 38, testified under oath that a lawyer assigned to him by Cambridge-based ***CRICO/RMF, a major medical malpractice insurance company, told him he was in a “lucky situation,”*** because he was in transition from Boston to Israel and as a result could not be easily served with a legal complaint.
The lawyer, George E. Wakeman Jr., vehemently denied the allegations through his own attorney, Michael E. Mone.
“The allegations made by Dr. Bar-Meir at his deposition regarding his conversations with Mr. Wakeman are simply not true,” he said in a statement to the Herald. “Dr. Bar-Meir’s allegations of improper conduct have been investigated by the appropriate authorities who have determined to take no action with regard to Mr. Wakeman.”
He refused to identify the authorities who investigated the allegations or when they did so.
“There are certain confidentiality provisions I can’t breach,” he said, declining to identify what those provisions are.
Bar-Meir was one of six doctors sued last year by Michael K. Hicks, 40, of Quincy, who blamed his painful and disfiguring June 27 plastic surgery complications on poor care at Beth Israel Deaconess and the impairment of his surgeon, Dr. Loren J. Borud, who was fired.
Bar-Meir was summoned to replace Borud mid-operation and performed two-thirds of the surgery, according to Hicks’ lawyer, Max Borten of Waltham. The malpractice case was settled in December, with the terms undisclosed. Hicks lost his left nipple as a result of complications from the surgery, Borten said.
At the time the lawsuit was filed, on July 25, Bar-Meir had completed his two-year fellowship at Beth Israel and was traveling cross-country on vacation before returning to his native Israel to practice.
In a Sept. 26 deposition on public file in the civil division at Suffolk Superior Court in Boston, Bar-Meir testified that Wakeman, who was initially assigned to Bar-Meir’s case by CRICO/RMF, left him a cell phone message sometime during the first two weeks of August.
In that message, Bar-Meir testified, Wakeman recommended to him that he not return the lawyer’s call, and told him that Bar-Meir could not be served papers in Israel. Bar-Meir said he did not preserve the voice recording. He testified that he called Wakeman back three weeks later.
“He repeated, with every small detail, the exact instructions and explaining to me that I’m in a very lucky situation that it is very hard to find me. And if I remain undiscoverable - that was his word - I can just get out of the country without anyone knowing,” he testified in his deposition.
Michael A. Fredrickson, the general counsel for the state Board of Bar Overseers, which investigates complaints of attorney misconduct, said the board does not comment on investigations if no public action results. Wakeman has no public disciplinary record, according to Fredrickson and the board’s Web site, mass.gov/obcbbo/.
Mark Horgan, vice president of claims for CRICO/RMF, said he does not believe the allegation by Bar-Meir in the deposition.
“I’ve concluded it’s not true,” he said of Bar-Meir’s sworn testimony. He said he based his decision on conversations with staff who were involved with the Hicks case. “George has been a respected member of our defense panel for years,” he said.
Bar-Meir said he stands behind his deposition. Bar-Meir spoke by phone to the Herald from his home in Israel, where he works as a plastic surgeon at a major medical center.
Bar-Meir returned to Boston for personal business Aug. 28, 2008 - two months after the Hicks surgery - and was served with the lawsuit and a subpoena for his deposition on arrival at Logan International Airport, he said. Prior to Bar-Meir’s Sept. 26 deposition, Wakeman withdrew his representation of Bar-Meir and a new attorney was assigned to him by CRICO/RMF, Bar-Meir testified.
Article URL: bostonherald.com |
