Shasta Regional Medical Center
Shasta Regional Medical Center has been serving the communities of Redding and Shasta County since 1945 and is one of two medical centers serving Redding, California. Shasta Regional Medical Center is a 246-bed acute care hospital, offering a diverse range of services from emergency medicine, cardiovascular, neurosciences, to critical care and general/specialty surgery.[1]
Some facts about Shasta Regional Medical Center
• Prime Healthcare Services purchased hospital in November, 2008
• Licensed beds: 246
• Employees: 700+
• Physicians Affiliated: 350
History
It was purchased by Tenet Healthcare Corporation in 1976 and renamed Redding Medical Center. In 2002, amid a federal investigation of two cardiologists at the hospital, Drs. Chae Hyun Moon and Fidel Realyvasquez,[2][3][4][5] and as part of a settlement with federal regulators, Tenet Healthcare Corporation was compelled to sell the hospital to Hospital Partners of America for $60 million USD in 2004.[6] Hospital Partners of America then renamed the hospital to its current name of Shasta Regional Medical Center and took measures to insure that this incident would not occur in the future.[7]
Hospital Partners of America went into bankruptcy in 2008, and the hospital operations were taken over by Prime Healthcare Services.
Shasta Regional is the only hospital in Shasta County certified as a Chest Pain Center and became a Primary Stroke Center for the region in 2006. Shasta Regional was the first hospital in California and 11th in the nation to be certified as an Advanced Inpatient Diabetes Care hospital in 2010 by The Joint Commission.
Shasta Regional was named as one of nation’s “Top Performers on Key Quality Measures™” by The Joint Commission based on improved care and positive patient outcomes for Heart Attack, Heart Failure, Pneumonia and Surgical Care in 2010. [8]
Licensed and Accredited
Shasta Regional Medical Center is fully accredited by The Joint Commission, the organization that sets the standards for care across the United States and is licensed by the state of California.
• Certified by The Joint Commission as an Advanced Primary Stroke Center since 2006 [9]
• Certified by The Joint Commission as an Advanced In-patient Diabetes Care Center in 2010.[10]
• Gold Performance Achievement Award from the American Heart Association and American Stroke Association "Get with the Guidelines" since 2005.[11]
• Diabetes Care Center certified by The American Diabetes Association since 2005.
Possible HIPAA Violations
In 2012, two executives at Prime Healthcare Services disclosed a patient's chart to multiple media outlets without the patient's consent. The release was in response to a California Watch article on Prime Healthcare Services billing practices at Shasta Regional Medical Center. In this incident, Randall Hempling, the hospital CEO, and Dr. Marcia McCampbell, its chief medical officer, showed up at the offices of the Redding Record Searchlight with Darlene Courtois in order to refute an article which was about to be published. Courtois did not consent to this release as is required under HIPAA. The hospital admits that they did not have written consent, but instead claim that: "As far as we're concerned, the patient gave that permission when she gave her records to California Watch and was quoted on the record. That waived her privacy." But under HIPAA, there is no such thing as implied authorization. [12] The FBI has questioned Courtois in regards to this information release. [13]
References
- ^ http://www.shastaregional.com
- ^ New York Times 11/6/2002
- ^ New York Times 11/16/2005
- ^ New York Times 11/4/2002
- ^ Washington Post 7/25/2005
- ^ Tenet Healthcare Agrees to Sell Redding, Calif., Medical Center.
- ^ Redding.com 10/30/2008
- ^ http://www.jointcommission.org/top_performers_on_key_quality_measures/
- ^ http://www.jointcommission.org/certification/primary_stroke_centers.aspx
- ^ http://www.jointcommission.org/certification/inpatient_diabetes.aspx
- ^ http://www.heart.org/HEARTORG/HealthcareProfessional/GetWithTheGuidelinesHFStroke/Get-With-The-Guidelines---HFStroke_UCM_001099_SubHomePage.jsp
- ^ http://articles.latimes.com/2012/jan/04/business/la-fi-hiltzik-20120104/2
- ^ http://www.redding.com/news/2012/jan/10/local-prime-patient-visited-by-feds/