Tulare doctors, hospital settle lawsuit
Tulare Regional Medical Center (TRMC) and the Tulare Regional Medical Center Medical Staff (MEC) have announced a settlement of the MEC’S lawsuit against TRMC and its former management company.
The settlement concludes a lengthy legal dispute over TRMC’S former board’s violation of the self-governance rights of its medical staff by terminating its duly-elected officers on January 26, 2016, and replacing it with a new medical staff with a different set of leaders and bylaws.
This settlement brings back into the fold the medical staff and doctors who served the hospital prior to 2016, which will be necessary to reopen the hospital in the next few months. The previous action was taken by the old board, none of whom serve today. The new board made it a goal to get the suit settled and improve its standing with the medical staff.
“Doctors make any hospital successful,” said hospital board president Kevin Northcraft. “We are especially grateful for the MEC’S willingness to put the past behind us, resolve this matter and move forward with us toward reopening the hospital.”
“Today’s settlement is a significant victory in protecting the ability of doctors, individually and through their medical staffs, to care for patients in Tulare County,” said California Medical Association (CMA) President Theodore M. Mazer, M.D. “This settlement brings closure to a long legal fight over the improper interference into the physicianpatient relationship and the autonomy of a medical staff’s responsibility for medical decision making and peer review.
It sends an important message well beyond Tulare, but most importantly, it allows for the Tulare Regional Medical Center to begin the process of reopening its doors to the patients of Tulare County, who have suffered tremendously from its closure.”
The hospital was closed in October 2017 after the newly comprised board filed for bankruptcy protection and a bankruptcy judge ended the contract with the former management company.
“To have a successful reopening, we need our doctors back, and the settlement of the lawsuit with our doctors is a critical step to our reopening. It also reverses one of the horrific mistakes of the former board that led to our hospital’s bankruptcy,” added Northcraft.
Ben Nicholson, an attorney with Mccormick Barstow, Llp,which represents the hospital district, said the settlement fully reinstates the medical staff, its bylaws and leadership to how it existed prior to its termination on Jan. 26, 2016.
“The basic idea of the settlement is to restore the status quo that existed before January 26, 2016,” Nicholson said.
Besides restoring the doctors’ privileges and the executive committee, the settlement stipulates that the hospital’s previous board actions violated the medical staff’s right to selfgovernance.
After reviewing letters of interest from four hospitals to partner with the hospital district or lease Tulare Regional Medical Center, on June 27, 2018, the District selected Adventist Health as its exclusive partner with whom to negotiate the re-opening and longterm lease of the Hospital.
Tulare Local Healthcare District Board Member Xavier Avila said that the selection of Adventist Health this week makes the timing of the settlement with the MEC particularly helpful. “It’s been a good week for the district,” Avila said. “First we partnered with Adventist Health to help get the hospital reopened. Now with this settlement we’ve taken an important step toward getting our doctors back.”
The lawsuit, filed in 2016, had been heard in 2017 by Superior Court Judge David Mathias, but his ruling was stayed by the bankruptcy filing. The parties’ proposed stipulated final judgment, which found the hospital violated the medical staff’s rights, is included with the settlement and will be sent to Judge Mathias with a request that he enter the judgment.