Countywide : State Panel Targets 3 County Physicians

The Medical Board of California has filed civil complaints against radiologist Donald B. Beamon and physician Charles P. Nichols, accusing them of negligence, and is seeking to remove or suspend their medical licenses.

In an unrelated case, the medical board accused Dr. Leonardo Garduno of “dishonesty” in allegations of failing to tell Humana Hospital-Westminster that his surgical privileges had been revoked when he was in the Air Force.

In its complaint against Nichols, the board said one of his patients died after the Garden Grove physician allegedly failed to monitor her condition properly, to pick up “the early signs of diabetes” and to begin appropriate treatment.

Nichols could not be reached Friday for comment.

According to the complaint, Nichols saw his patient a few days before she died from complications of diabetes, learned that she had recently lost 40 pounds and had high blood pressure and dry lips. But he still gave her no physical examination, the board alleged, and instead gave her samples of a medicine called Micro K.

When she called the next day, reporting vomiting, he blamed the medicine and told her to keep taking it. Later that day, the patient’s sister called to report that his patient was delirious. She died on March 11, 1987, at Corona Hospital.

The board said Nichols “did no complete physical examinations or laboratory tests” on this patient in 3 1/2 years of caring for her but could have picked up early signs of diabetes and begun treatment had he done so.

The board also accused radiologist Beamon of “gross negligence,” incompetence and repeated negligent acts because he read Magnetic Resonance Imaging scans of 10 patients incorrectly.

In some of these cases, the medical board said, the Santa Ana radiologist allegedly described abnormalities or damage to the spine “that does not exist.”

Beamon could not be reached Friday for comment.

The medical board also accused physician Garduno of Irvine of “unprofessional conduct and dishonesty” when, in an application to join Humana Hospital-Westminster, he failed to disclose that his Air Force surgical privileges had been revoked. Garduno could not be reached Friday for comment.

The board reported that Garduno’s surgical privileges were “permanently withdrawn” on March 12, 1982, after a surgery consultant to the Air Force observed that Garduno took “a protracted period of time to make simple intra-operative decisions,” had “somewhat antiquated” ideas of technical concepts and lacked the confidence of nurses and doctors.

If any of the doctors wish to contest the complaints, the board will schedule a hearing before an administrative law judge.