Med Mal News

Police have dropped all charges against Rebecca Leighton, a nurse arrested by the United Kingdom's Greater Manchester Police in July in connection with several patient deaths at Stepping Hill Hospital. Three patients died at the Stockport, Cheshire, hospital after they were administered saline tainted with insulin. Others at the hospital may also have been sickened by adulterated saline bags, including four whose deaths are still under investigation. The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) determined that there was inadequate evidence to the support the charge of criminal damage intended to endanger life, but it did not rule out re-charging Leighton, stating in a release: “As this is very much a complex investigation with lines of inquiry still being followed, there is the prospect that further evidence might emerge which the CPS would then consider alongside the evidence gathered so far. The law does allow us to reinstate charges in those circumstances, particularly where the allegations are serious.”

Bill Would Give All Physician Assistants Same EHR-Adoption Payments As Doctors

Representatives Karen Bass (D-CA) and Lee Terry (R-NE) introduced a bill in Congress in August that would extend to all physician assistants financial incentives to encourage them to implement electronic health record (EHR) systems. Currently, only physicians, nurse practitioners and a subset of physician assistants are eligible under the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act to seek incentive payments for the adoption and use of EHR systems. The bill, known as the Health IT Modernization for Underserved Communities Act of 2011, H.R. 2729, would amend the Social Security Act to delete from the requirement for financial incentives that the physician assistant practice in a rural health center or in a federally qualified health center. Instead, these professionals would be held to the same standard as physicians and nurse practitioners; they would be able to collect the incentive funds if they adopt qualified HER systems and at least 30% of their patients are Medicaid recipients to whom they provide primary health care services. Robert Wooten, president of the American Academy of Physician Assistants, expressed the group's support for the bill in a statement, saying, “The ultimate beneficiaries of electronic medical records are patients, and this bill extends the promise of improved medical care to the Medicaid patients” treated by physician assistants.

UK Nurse Accused of Tampering with Saline Bags Released from Custody

Police have dropped all charges against Rebecca Leighton, a nurse arrested by the United Kingdom's Greater Manchester Police in July in connection with several patient deaths at Stepping Hill Hospital. Three patients died at the Stockport, Cheshire, hospital after they were administered saline tainted with insulin. Others at the hospital may also have been sickened by adulterated saline bags, including four whose deaths are still under investigation. The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) determined that there was inadequate evidence to the support the charge of criminal damage intended to endanger life, but it did not rule out re-charging Leighton, stating in a release: “As this is very much a complex investigation with lines of inquiry still being followed, there is the prospect that further evidence might emerge which the CPS would then consider alongside the evidence gathered so far. The law does allow us to reinstate charges in those circumstances, particularly where the allegations are serious.”