Frist Votes favored HCA

According to an investigation by the Nashville Tennessean, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frists' voting record in the senate overwhelmingly favors HCA Inc,. The Nashville-based for-profit hospital chain that was founded by Dr. Frists brother and father and has formed the basis for the families wealth.

Predictably, Dr. Frists' office said he was unavailable for comment regarding the newspapers investigation into his voting record.

I have been screaming for years that he had an inherent conflict of interest that could not be ameliorated by a mere dumping of his personal stock (which he didn't do until recently, and the ethics folks are peeking behind that particular curtain, along with the SEC.)

Apparently I am no longer the lone flake, dismissed as a disgruntled former employee. Just because I used to work for the company doesn't automatically dismiss my concerns as those of a disgruntled former employee with an axe to grind. I do loathe the Frists' and HCA's business practices, but that doesn't delegitimize my concerns and complaints.

Mike Sarrusco, the Ethics Director of Common Cause, a non-partisan government watchdog group, had this to say about the good doctors conflicting loyalties: "Because he owned so much stock in HCA...There is the appearance that any legislation that could help the company would have been helpful to him financially."

Some examples of blatantly obvious HCA assisting by Dr. Frist:

In July Dr. Frist introduced a bill that would simultaneously help insure the uninsured (a lofty goal on the surface) and limit jury awards. HCA is for profit, but they still operate under EMTALA (Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act) the federal law that all American hospitals are held to. Emergency treatment can not be denied. Period. Uninsured patients hurt HCA which is a for-profit healthcare chain. The company set aside $2.7 billion in 2004 for such doubtful accounts. I watched a couple million of those dollars evaporate at Research Medical Center when inner-city young black men died of gunshot wounds in the trauma room. Dead drug dealers don't pay hospital bills. As for the jury awards side of the bill: HCA Indemnity Inc is one of the largest underwriters of malpractice insurance in the nation. This arm of the family business would be helped immensely by limited jury awards. And you can bet that premiums wouldn't go down.

Dr. Frist has also supported legislation that gave hospitals more money for treating seniors, (hospitals have to accept the "Medicare assignment" the government pays, and not bill the patient for the difference like your doctor does if you have regular health insurance.) He has also attempted to curb the development of specialty hospitals that compete with HCA for patients and dollars.

Less obvious ways in which Dr. Frist has assisted HCA Inc. include vehemently opposing the "Patients Bill of Rights" that was sponsored by Democrats a few years ago. That Patients Bill of Rights would have given patients the right to sue their HMO's (a majority of HCA employees and families are covered by the self-insuring HCA HMO SmartCare) and collect unlimited damages. The AMA supported the bill. Dr. Frist, an AMA member and former heart-lung transplant surgeon, opposed it, arguing that it wouldn't really help patients, it would help trial lawyers. Had the bill passed into law, the added cost of Jury awards would have placed a great deal of financial pressure on HCA's revenue. At the time the bill was being debated, in 2001, HMO's accounted for slightly more than 42% of HCA's revenue.

Of course, a spokesman for HCA, one Jeff Prescott, spouted the predictable line about the company not lobbying the Senator, and trying to keep him at arms length. The thing is, there is no way he can be totally neutral. Questions about the species of those who comprise the far-right aside, he is still a human being and subject to all of our frailties and shortfallings. Every time he shares a meal with his family, he is subject to influence.