| 03/05/2005 |
| Doctors have fallen victim to their own 'crisis' campaign |
| Editor: I have been amused over the past few months to see the deluge of expensive advertising by Northeastern Pennsylvania hospitals trying to reverse the damage they inflicted on themselves through their "malpractice crisis" public relations campaign. For the past few years, our doctors have been running around like Chicken Little screaming, "The Sky Is Falling! The Sky Is Falling!" They keep saying doctors - especially obstetrician/gynecologists - are fleeing Northeastern Pennsylvania because of rising liability insurance rates and predatory trial lawyers. But time has shown that this was simply a scare tactic, and now our hospitals are spending tens of thousands of dollars to reverse the damage caused by their own propaganda. Recent full-page ads in the Times-Tribune newspapers by Community Medical Center have hailed the arrival of two new ob/gyns to the staff of their Women's Care Center under the headline, "An Excellent Choice for Women Everywhere." Another ad by Wayne Memorial Hospital touts its maternity services, assuring, "Your New Life Begins Here." Recent Geisinger ads in the Wilkes-Barre papers have used headlines like "Healthcare Just for Women in Wilkes-Barre" and "The Doctor Is In," just in case you were under the impression they had all left. Within days after the Wilkes-Barre papers reported on the "tragic" closing of the maternity ward at Mercy Hospital, General Hospital ran ads welcoming the two ob/gyns from Mercy to the staff of its own maternity ward. So Wilkes-Barre didn't lose any ob/gyn services - the doctors just moved down the street. It's time for reporters to start reading their own papers and connecting the dots. The doctors and hospitals want to take away injured patients' rights because, they say, it will save money on insurance costs. Perhaps they should stop putting out so much misinformation. That way, they wouldn't have to spend so much money on advertising to reverse its effect. Denise Gordon Taylor |