| Dr. Richard Isaacs |
| Dr. Richard Isaacs Physician Administrator Absent When Patients Require Assistance - Politically Rather Than Medically Motivated Personality Sacramen |
| 2nd of Jul, 2011 by User715730 |
| Dr. Richard Isaacs, Physician in Chief, South Sacramento, Kaiser Permanente, is a danger to patients. His hands off modus operandi when a physician abuses patients is well known. It matters not how many times a patient in pain appeals to this administrator, he will always find ways to either ignore the appeal or refer the matter to his legal staff, in order to find reasons that the patient is being unreasonable, hostile or, worse. The only physicians in danger on Dr. Isaacs watch seem to be physicians who are patient oriented vs fiscally bent on providing minimum care for maximum fees. The silences emanating from Dr. Isaacs' office, and his reliance on the famous and potentially illegal Permanente Medical Group employment contract to silence anyone who would agree that a patient is being harmed is truly ghastly to observe. Recently, Dr. Isaacs abandonment of an elderly patient in crisis, opting instead to support, as usual, threats from his Legal Office, was reported to the California Medical Board. Dr. Isaacs is a plastic surgeon. Therefore he is an expert in terms of creating different faces. Certainly this doctor uses many of them on a daily basis, championing fiscally producing physicians, and disadvantaging those who have heard, and what's more adhere to, a semblance of the Hippocratic Oath. A truly dangerous physician. |
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In a leadership position, it is so very important to have persons willing to make the hard decisions, especially in the face of patients being endangered by the poor judgment of an affirmative action female employee.
In those kinds of situations, the last thing a patient requires is a quiet, go along individual without spark in his or her soul. A patient being placed in a dangerous situation needs a person with strength who understands that politics and collegial loyalty can only go so far, and, after that, the patient must come first.
Unfortunately, Dr. Richard Isaacs cannot provide the kind of strength needed to protect patients at the South Sacramento Kaiser facility. It is not his fault. It is a matter of character. It is the fault of senior managers in the Bay Area that they continually appoint physicians in leadership positions without the least idea of what solid management looks like.
I wager there isn't a degree in management or leadership in the entire Permanente Medical Group. |
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The rap on him is that he is a decent guy at moments who needs to get out of the politics of his office.
He isn't equipped for either leadership or the in-fighting that happens in a large organization. Therefore, he spends most of his time not dealing with anything.
This most recent report is consistent with the file I maintain on him. |
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Let me share with you a real experience I had with Kaiser Permanente that may shed some light on Dr. Isaac's behavior.
It is true that he could have been so much more proactive, and there is no excuse that he wasn't.
However, in my case, when I had a "Kaiser" problem, as soon as it was escalated any distance at all up the chain of command, I received a contact from an attorney ordering me not to contact anyone further at Kaiser to solve my problem.
In other words, the attorney wanted me not to contact the very people who had the power to solve the problem.
Lucky for me, I ignored the attorney. He kept threatening me, if I didn't stop trying to solve the problem, and I kept ignoring him.
Finally, I found a fellow working in the chain of command with a heart, and the problem was solved.
My point here is that I think a lot of the problems created at Kaiser Permanente are due to bad advice from lawyers.
They really don't want to solve the problems, especially if they are paid on a billable hour basis as this attorney was above. I know that because he worked for a private firm under contract with Kaiser.
That is what is called a HUGE conflict of interest.
So, in this case, as soon as Dr. Isaacs refused to take care of the problem at his level, and as soon as a contract attorney was consulted, this whole situation was lost, IF the chain of command wasn't strong enough to tell the lawyer to go to hell, which evidently they weren't.
No longer was an amicable solution possible, since the attorney's advice would almost certainly have been to be silent and let the problem fester.
I can still remember this lawyer threatening me over and over again about not trying to solve the problem out of court. It was such an evil message, and I think we have lots of that in America.
I am a Japanese citizen, and have relatives in Japan. They were thinking about expanding their law schools a while back, and the reason that was defeated was that they didn't want to have lawyers ruining their culture as they do in the United States.
How many speeches I heard in Japan saying things like, "Do you want to be like the United States with greedy lawyers by the millions trying to stir up trouble." Of course, the people of Japan didn't want that. (By comparison, the US has one lawyer for every 265 citizens. Japan has one lawyer for every 10, 000 citizens. And, every lawyer in American thinks he or she should be rich. What a mess! lawyers have made of this Country.)
So what I am saying is that Dr. Isaacs probably had a chance to solve the problem early on, but, after a short while, Kaiser contract lawyers would have simply told everyone who had taken the Hippocratic Oath to shut off communication.
Of course, that's the worst possible advice. It just begs for more conflict when one side is being given terrible advice. But there it is. Failing to communicate with a person who is suffering is just asking for that person to become both very angry and very frustrated.
You want to take a shot at real evil, I can give you the name of the Firm representing Kaiser that, had I listened to them, we would probably still be in court. As it was, the problem was solved at the physician level, where it should have been all along. |
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Richard Isaacs, Physician in Chief, South Sacramento Kaiser Permanente, in many ways is a fine man and doctor, if he had remained with those he would have been a star.
As an administrator, though, Richard Isaacs is clearly at sea.
Richard Isaacs is more than willing to believe and act upon information delivered by credible, aggressive personalities, right or wrong, especially if those personalities are societally favored affirmative action appointments as is the case with the female physician mentioned above.
Richard Isaacs has difficulty opposing such personalities in favor of milder, more vulnerable colleagues.
Richard Isaacs is like many doctors who attempt to lead without training in that area.
It is assumed, wrongly, that doctors can lead just because they have medical degrees. As a matter of fact, just the opposite is true.
Doctors are trained to obey, not to lead others. It is an unusual personality who can complete pre-med, medical school, internships and residencies, all those experiences depending on pleasing others, and emerge prepared to lead.
Richard Isaacs is a good surgeon. However, if he wishes to lead or manage others, he needs at least two years of graduate work in the management/leadership area, as well as an internship, before he would be prepared for a leadership role.
As it is, he and Dr. Evan Bloom (Assistant Physician in Chief) as a team are not prepared to provide competent leadership at the South Sacramento Kaiser facility. They may be great doctors, both. But, that means nothing when faced with strong personalities misleading them. |
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