Court Dismisses Doctor’s Claims

A Superior Court judge has dismissed claims by a local cardiologist that Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center improperly suspended him in 2003 after he criticized the hospital’s administrators.

Halfway through the trial, Judge Warren Ettinger ruled last week that Dr. Osamah El-Attar had not proved that he was singled out for discipline. The judge also ruled that El-Attar had not shown that he suffered damages as a direct result of his suspension.

Hospital officials suspended El-Attar briefly in early 2003 after independent medical reviewers found serious concerns with the way he cared for patients. The hospital also revoked El-Attar’s staff privileges, but he remains on staff while appealing.

El-Attar plans to appeal the court ruling, his attorney, Douglas Schwab, said Thursday.

Officials with Hollywood Presbyterian, which until last month was owned by Tenet Healthcare Corp., said they were pleased with the judge’s ruling.

“Our ultimate issue was not to protect Dr. El-Attar but rather to protect our patients,” said Albert Greene, the hospital’s chief executive.

El-Attar’s dispute with the hospital was featured in a front-page story in The Times in July 2003 about who should monitor the care provided by physicians.

Fearing that its own doctors were not properly reviewing their peers, the hospital’s governing board had hired outside experts to extensively review unexpected deaths and complications.

The doctors saw a dangerous precedent: Corporate administrators, who were intruding into so much of modern medicine, would now presume to judge patient care after the fact.

At the time, the hospital was known as Queen of Angels-Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center.

Greene said Thursday that the hospital has not used outside reviewers for at least a year and was now confident that its physicians were appropriately monitoring one another’s care.