If I Die, Blame Sutter Health

I am a Sutter Health Sacramento Sierra Region patient through a UnitedHealthcare Medicare Advantage program. A few weeks ago, I had an endoscopy and colonoscopy where they found precancerous polyps in my colon that were removed. They also found precancerous polyps in my stomach that need removal by a different physician. The first physician made a referral as soon as the lab results were back.?

After waiting two weeks, the referral was still pending. I contacted the referring physician who asked me to wait another two weeks. After another week, I called the patient advocate's office and was told the physician's office had 48 hours to respond. After two weeks, no response.?

I called the patient advocate's office again 5 weeks after the referral. After a nearly 10-minute hold, she reported trying to reach the office of the physician I need to see … with no progress. This ultimately resulted in a procedure date of October 4, seven weeks after the referral. This sounds frustrating but with a good outcome so far. Not quite.

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The fundamental problem is that my referral, more importantly, my medical issue was the responsibility of no one.

I asked why there was no follow-up on the first complaint and she told me, that each person in that office handles around 200 complaints A DAY. As a result, they have no time or mechanism for follow-up when a provider ignores a complaint.

I hope and pray my stomach polyps are not urgent or life-threatening, but I simply don't know. They do need to come out. Each month Sutter Health gets money from United?Health and from me. And this healthcare system that is taking money from Medicare and me each month is not delivering on what they promised.

Sutter Leadership

According to their 2019 990 IRS form, then CEO and president Sarah Krevans took home more than 5.5 million dollars. It is reasonable to assume that their interim president and CEO, James Conforti,? is making similar a amount. They have an additional dozen or so employees whose total compensation is over a million dollars a year.

I promise these leaders never have to wait, never have to wade through impossible phone trees, that their family members never had to wait. That they receive kid glove treatment, and they jump to the front of the line.

Killers

I have the power of an audience and the tenaciousness of an investigative reporter to advocate for my healthcare, something most people do not. This is particularly true for 80- and 90-year-olds.

They are not singling me out or picking on me. I am on no one's radar, or at least I wasn't before writing this. It is reasonable to infer that this is happening to thousands of Sutter Health patients each month … each year.

I believe with 100% certainty that this because of this treatment, patients for whom they have a sacred duty to care, to protect, are dying because of this negligence. I worry they will kill me.?

It is clear they don't care. They make big fat salaries and feel good about their titles and badges and the awards they receive … and they kill people.

Sleep At Night

I find myself wondering how they can sleep at night knowing what they are doing hurts the very people they pledged to care for. This is immoral. It is stealing people's lives and quality of life.

Questions For Leadership

• Do you care?
• If I were your family member would you tolerate this?
• Why have you set up an accountability system that has no accountability?
• Is this a deliberate plan because some portion of those who are most frail will die early, saving Sutter millions of dollars each year?
• What are you going to do, to not simply fix my situation, but to fix it for all patients?
• How long will it take to fix it ... assuming you care enough to fix it?

If You Work For Sutter

If you work for Sutter in any capacity, you should quit. If you stay, you are helping these leaders do serious damage to vulnerable people. There are honest ethical companies out there and lots of jobs that need filling. Send a message to the leaders of Sutter that they need to do the right thing.

I reached out to Sutter for comment and after a week received this:

Throughout the Sutter network, safe and quality patient care is at the core of our mission - we always want our patients to have the best experience possible. Our teams work closely with patients to help facilitate needed care. When we receive a complaint, we take it very seriously and work to fully resolve any concerns.?Sutter is proud to be a nationally recognized leader in healthcare quality and, in pursuit of our community-focused mission, we are committed to continuous improvements?in our patients’ experiences.??

At best a blah response that rings hollow.

They also asked me to make note of the fact that I was finally given an appointment for early October. Except that ...

Another Surprise Was Coming

Within hours of receiving their official response, I got a call from the physician's office telling me that he would have to postpone the procedure until after November 1, effectively a month out. Then, because of my travel, we settled on a date of November 17; three months after the referral was made.

I tried to make it work with them. I asked if there was any other physician in the system who could do the procedure and was told no. An unimaginable answer undoubtedly given to the hundreds of thousands of patients they serve (or don't serve).

Patient Advocate Angel

After another call to the patient advocate, we finally settled on a date just two days after the original date. which as of the date of publication still holds.

Suffering and Death

I find myself ready to take this on as a crusade, knowing that people are being hurt, and undoubtedly people are dying. For sure, people are suffering days, weeks, and months while waiting for treatment.

I am no fan of personal injury attorneys, but given the tepid response to my situation by Sutter, I hope and pray one of them will see this article and decide to go looking for clients and cases. I am not sure anything else will get their attention.