Complaints Against Kaiser Heard Sooner

A year after a legal case and a devastating internal report forced Kaiser Permanente to revamp its system of binding arbitration, complaints against the state’s largest HMO are being heard sooner, according to a report issued by the independent attorney who now runs the program. Under the new system, which is run by an outside office and funded jointly by Kaiser and patients who file claims, arbitrators are assigned to cases 16 times faster than in the past, said Sharon Lybeck Hartmann, who runs the program and holds the title of independent administrator. Hartmann, in her first annual report on the progress of the new program, said it typically took 674 days under the old system before a patient was assigned an arbitrator; now, the average is just under 43 days. All told, Hartmann said in her report, 680 patients--who are prevented by Kaiser’s rules from suing in court--used the new arbitration system over the last year, 94% of them alleging malpractice. Fewer than 1% of them alleged that the HMO had improperly denied care, the report said. Seventy-three of the cases were settled, and 22 went to trial. The report is available at https://www.slhartmann.com/oia, or through Hartmann’s office at (213) 637-9847 or Kaiser at (800) 464-4000.