Now that so many physicians are controlled by hospital systems, the landscape for patients is precarious. We saw the potential for wrong-doing by hospital systems become blatant– for all to see- during Covid.
An excellent bill is moving through the NC Senate. It would do several things:
- Provide whistleblower protections to physicians who complain about conditions that impact patient safety or when breaches of ethics take place;
- Makes illegal restrictive covenants (“non-competes”) for physicians;
- Sharply limits non-disclosure agreements required of physicians to protect communications about violations that impact patient safety or ethics;
- Limits hospital CEO salaries for non-profit institutions.
This is a bill that ought to pass the Senate. If it does, I suspect that Rep. Donny Lambeth in the NC House– the former Winston-Salem hospital administrator who represents hospital systems in the state legislature– will do everything he can to kill it.
Yup, there has always been a sort of cold war going on between hospitals and physicians.
This bill goes a long way to level the playing field.
It would be even better, Fred, to have a bill that prohibits physicians being employed by hospital systems. But I was glad– and pleasantly surprised– to see the content of this bill.