Santa Clara County has fined private health systems more than 40,000 for failing to comply with its coronavirus testing order.
HCA Healthcare’s regional medical center in San Jose was fined 22 22,750 for failing to adequately notify patients of their right to a Covid-19 test.
An enforcement officer inspected the center on Oct. 20, noting that notices of COVID-19 testing had not been “explicitly” posted in 13 different rooms at the hospital, according to the violation notice. The hospital failed to rectify the breach under the county’s 48-hour grace period, and the county fined Oct. 27.
In addition, HCA’s Good Samaritan Hospital was fined ,500 8,500 – $ 3,500 for inadequate instruction to patients and $ 5,000 for failing to test a qualified patient.
According to county officials, a registered nurse used the county’s complaint portal, in which Sara Samaritan Hospital denied him a diagnostic diagnosis on Oct. 10, the nurse, who was symptomatic, sought care in the hospital’s emergency room and also informed hospital staff. That she was. In contact with a Covid-19 patient at his workplace. The nurse was eventually able to get tested by the county in Santa Clara County Fairgrounds.
“We are pleased to report that this issue has been addressed and signals have now been placed in all required areas,” HCH Healthcare spokeswoman Sarah Sherwood said November 27.
County Councilman James Williams announced in September that the county would penalize private health systems for failing to provide adequate access to COVID-19 tests.
“Private providers are still significantly behind the county in the COVID-19 test,” county officials said. “Private healthcare systems are required under the revised testing order to educate patients about their right to COVID-19 testing.”
According to the county, private hospitals can accomplish this through instructions posted on their website, promotional materials and physical locations. “Once patients are aware of their rights and the provider is conducting continuous tests for all categories of patients covered by the revised test order, we would expect to see a significant increase in testing by the provider,” county officials said.
The other four violations of the county’s trial order were corrected within the grace period and therefore no fines were struck, the county said. County public health officials have sharply criticized private hospitals for not conducting adequate COVID-19 tests.
In September, former deputy county executive David Campos blamed hospitals for not moving the county down to the lower-level to reopen industries.
“The county is doing its job, we’re checking more than our fair share,” Campos said at the time. “If these private health hospitals really tested at the level we wanted to test them, we would be in orange (tires) today.”
Two other hospitals were fined for inadequate instruction to patients. The county fined these centers for the same reason – not enough signs were posted on facilities informing patients of the convenience-19 test of their rights.
The county fined the Palo Alto Medical Foundation’s Palo Alto, Sunnyvale and San Jose centers 8,250 for giving improper instruction to patients. The county also imposed a 7 7,750 fine on Kaiser Permanent’s San Jose Medical Center. The Palo Alto Medical Foundation did not respond to a request for comment.
Irene Chavez, manager of Kaiser Permanente’s San Jose Medical Center, said the company responded by placing signs in the center’s emergency room ambulance bay.
According to Chavez, Kaiser’s Northern California offices have recently increased their daily testing capacity to more than 12,000 tests a day following the purchase of new lab equipment and facilities.
Hospitals in Santa Clara County have performed far more COVID-19 tests than private health systems, according to a report submitted to the Board of Supervisors on Nov. 10 by the county’s public health department.
Nov. 2 and Nov. Between 8, the county conducted 18,402 tests, while Kaiser Permanente of Northern California conducted 9,370 tests. 5,416 tests were performed by Stanford Health Care Hospital, 1,928 tests were performed by Sutter Health and the Palo Alto Medical Foundation, and 1,245 tests were performed by El Camino Health.
Dr Christina Kong, medical director of pathology at Stanford Medicine, said the healthcare provider had not received any message from the county that it needed to increase its COVID-19 testing.
Kong said Stanford Health is currently awaiting FDA approval to issue home self-storage kits that will be tested in a clinical virology laboratory.
The executive director of the American Public Health Association, Dr. George Benjamin said comprehensive testing is important to inform public health officials on how the virus is spreading so they can advise on best practices and issue adequate orders for health.
People who test positive for the virus can also be isolated to prevent the disease from spreading to others.
“We use testing in a variety of ways,” Benjamin said. “If we’re testing randomly, and see a large number of people in the community who have a particular disease, we can advise those people to test and avoid risky activities.” “
The story was originally published by San Jose Spotlight and was written and reported by Sonia Herrera. Please use the original link when sharing: https://sanjosespotlight.com/santa-clara-county-fines-h hospital- for-failing-to-comply-with-covid-19-testing-order /
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