UAPD Unmasks ‘Phantom' Docs

California Gov. Gray Davis (D) is expected to sign into law a bill that protects patients from "phantom" physician practices carried out by health maintenance organization (HMO) administrators.

State Sen. Liz Figueroa (D), with the full backing of the Union of American Physicians and Dentists (UAPD)/AFSCME Local 206, introduced Senate bill 1746 into the legislature when she learned that some HMOs weren't assigning primary care doctors to subscribers. Also, some companies aren't replacing physicians who are fired or voluntarily quit. HMO members, however, were led to believe they've been enrolled with primary care doctors as part of their HMO medical plan.

Dr. Charles Goodman, a UAPD board member, got a first-hand account of the practices before exposing the scam to Figueroa. He was trying to make an appointment with his own physician when he discovered he didn't have one: The doctor, he was told, had quit. In the meantime, the company was still accepting his monthly payments, which were supposed to ensure him a primary care doctor.

UAPD Pres. Dr. Robert Weinmann testified about these shameless practices at a legislative hearing emphasizing how they endanger patients' health and perhaps their lives. "When a patient gets sick, phones the doctor's office, then suddenly discovers the physician has been terminated by the HMO," he said, "the patient is forced to call another doctor whose schedule may be so full that [he or she] cannot get an appointment."

"HMOs have figured out a way to profit off their own decision to terminate doctors," says Figueroa. "When an HMO's economic choice comes at the expense of patients and doctors, it has to be stopped."