Third San Francisco doctor calls for full audit of Laguna Honda Hospital's patient gift fund

A third San Francisco doctor who formerly worked at Laguna Honda Hospital (LHH) has called for a full audit of LHH’s Patient Gift Fund.

Dr. Terry Palmer — a widely respected physician specializing in geriatric medicine who worked at LHH for 15 years before resigning, in part, over LHH’s changing mission to care for the elderly — believes the 72.4 percent decline in contributions to LHH’s Patient Gift Fund since 2007 is related to the corruption of the hospital’s mission to serve elderly and disabled San Franciscans.

“LHH hasn’t even admitted its mistake misappropriating charitable donations for patients to provide staff amenities. Since they’ve apparently forgotten who they’re supposed to be taking care of, an independent audit of the patient gift fund must be performed,” Palmer says.

Palmer worries elderly San Franciscans have been denied admission to Laguna Honda long before 2007, and before LHH opens its new campus. She suspects San Francisco General Hospital’s patients are being potentially put ahead of elderly San Franciscans who have nowhere else to go. “Laguna Honda was meant to be a safety net for all San Franciscans who need the care it offers, including care for the elderly,” she notes.

She believes curtailment in admissions of the elderly may be an even bigger scandal than the uproar which ensued after LHH’s director of community relations director, Marc Slavin, ignited a firestorm of public outrage when he told ABC-TV/Channel 7 investigative journalist Dan Noyes on May 20 that LHH’s patient gift fund is “not a gift fund for [our] residents.”

Former LHH physician Derek Kerr’s and Maria Rivero’s initial Patient Gift Fund whistleblower complaint on March 2 to the City Controller was forwarded by the Controller’s Whistleblower Complaint Program to San Francisco’s Ethics Commission, which in turn forwarded it to San Francisco’s District Attorney. Board of Supervisors Chris Daly has called for the City Attorney to also investigate LHH’s gift fund.

Kerr and Rivero filed two unrelated whistleblower complaints regarding other potential conflict of interest issues involving San Francisco’s Director of Public Health, Mitch Katz, MD, and the health department’s Community Behavioral Health Services director, Bob Cabaj, MD.

Unfortunately, to date there hasn’t been any meaningful response and no audit of the Patient Gift Fund, because their three complaints have languished.

On May 24, Kerr and Rivero submitted another complaint to the California Attorney General’s Registry of Charitable Trusts, requesting that the state audit LHH’s Patient Gift Fund.

“Various oversight authorities have an obligation to investigate,” Kerr maintains, convinced LHH’s patients and Patient Gift Fund donors deserve no less than a full audit.

Palmer, Rivero, and Kerr have long been LHH’s most vocal physicians, sustaining their professional and ethical obligation to serve as patient advocates.

Feedback: monette-shaw@westsideobserver.com.