2 UCI Doctors Face State Inquiry

The state medical board said it was investigating the chairman and former vice chairwoman of UC Irvine’s anesthesiology department, adding to the turmoil swirling around the school’s medical programs.

The anesthesiology department, which was already grappling with complaints by doctors about patient safety and possible sanctions for its residency programs, recently hired an executive coach to smooth tensions in the department.

But last week, some professors began discussing a petition to protest conditions, according to five doctors who asked that their names not be used for fear of retaliation.

State medical board officials wouldn’t reveal why they were investigating Dr. Peter Breen, the chairman, or Dr. Anne Wong, the former vice chairwoman, but a board spokeswoman said Tuesday that the inquiry involved allegations already on public record.

If so, the probe might be focused on claims made in a wrongful-termination lawsuit filed a year ago in Orange County Superior Court by former professor Dr. Glenn Provost.

Provost alleged that anesthesiology patients at UCI Medical Center in Orange were wheeled into operating rooms without proper consent or charts and that nurses’ signatures were forged on pre-operation records.

Speaking through a UCI spokeswoman, Breen declined requests for an interview. But in an e-mail to his staff Tuesday, he wrote that he and the hospital were unaware of any investigation by the medical board.

In February, Breen defended himself from the charges in Provost’s lawsuit, expressing confidence the department would be exonerated.

Two UCI investigations of the anesthesiology department in 2003 found “no evidence of compromise in patient safety,” according to an internal memo.

Wong, who stepped down as vice chairwoman and clinical director July 1, was reportedly on vacation and unavailable for comment. She remains on the faculty.

Unrest in UCI’s anesthesiology department dates to at least April 2003, when half of the department’s 26 professors signed a letter to Breen complaining that “the direction of the department has been radically altered to achieve financial goals at the expense of academic goals.”

Nine professors have left since then. Dr. Art Zepeda, who runs the department’s pain-management program, submitted a letter of resignation last month and then retracted it, officials said.

Zepeda declined to comment.

Earlier this year, his pain-management colleague Dr. Raafat Mattar resigned, describing the anesthesiology department as “a big mess” in an interview with The Times.

He said the pain program, which has been on probation with the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education since 1997, didn’t conduct enough academic research and suffered from shortages of X-ray machines and access to exam rooms, forcing cancer patients and others in pain to wait as long as two months for treatment.

Other doctors have complained about poor maintenance of anesthesia machines, inadequate orientation for nurses and missing equipment on anesthesia carts.

In May , the anesthesiology department was reviewed by an outside panel of experts as part of a top-to-bottom analysis of UCI medical programs.

The review came after a scandal in the liver transplant program, as well as deficiencies in the bone-marrow and kidney transplant programs, questions about cardiologists’ credentials, allegations of nepotism and other problems.

The results of the anesthesiology department review remain confidential.

After the report was completed, UCI hired a consultant, Dr. Susan Reynolds, to work with Breen.

Reynolds, whose website says her services include coaching “physician leaders facing challenging situations,” interviewed the staff and announced her findings at a department meeting Thursday night.

According to the five doctors, Reynolds blamed most of the department’s unrest on a handful of disgruntled professors.

In a telephone interview Friday, Reynolds declined to comment, except to say, “Dr. Breen sincerely wants to fix this and make the department better.”

Nevertheless, the five doctors said there was talk in the department about a work stoppage or a petition to the medical school dean demanding Breen’s departure. One, however, doubted that the stoppage would take place.

One of the five said such a move would be backed by 10 to 20 of the department’s 30 faculty members.

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roy.rivenburg@latimes.com