UK: Disgraced surgeon sentenced to 15 years' imprisonment for carrying out unnecessary operations - Sensationalist Headlines

[URL="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-birmingham-40108558"]Source.[/URL] [QUOTE]Breast surgeon Ian Paterson has been jailed for 15 years after carrying out unnecessary operations. Paterson, 59, operated on nine women and one man after falsely telling them they had breast cancer. He was convicted of 17 counts of wounding with intent and three of unlawful wounding, after a trial last month. Jurors at Nottingham Crown Court were told Paterson exaggerated or invented the risk of cancer. The NHS has paid almost £10m in compensation to hundreds of his patients, while more than 350 private patients will pursue civil action against him later this year. The court was told the defendant, of Altrincham, Greater Manchester, urged patients to undergo procedures for "obscure motives" that may have included a desire to "earn extra money". The trial heard accounts from 10 victims - representing a sample of those he treated - operated on between 1997 and 2011, at the privately-run Little Aston and Parkway hospitals in the West Midlands.[/QUOTE] Jfc this guy is grotesque, he deserves every year of that sentence.

That's monstrous beyond words and I can't believe money would be his primary motivation for this. I don't expect he'll reveal his reasons though. What's just as shocking from the article is that he continued to operate for years despite complaints and concerns from staff and others.

[QUOTE=MuTAnT;52295642]That's monstrous beyond words and I can't believe money would be his primary motivation for this. I don't expect he'll reveal his reasons though. What's just as shocking from the article is that he continued to operate for years despite complaints and concerns from staff and others.[/QUOTE] You'd be surprised. Similar shit happens often enough in India, but this time with the tacit approval of higher ups in corporate hospitals, especially to gain more revenue. That makes it even harder for the guilty parties to be brought to book unless somebody else squeals and has evidence. I wouldn't be surprised if fame and money were his motivations, though. Surgeons, in addition to their enormous salaries, get fat fees for every surgery they get, and the more surgeries they perform, the more money and the more professional exposure they receive. The management and their higher ups also permit them to perform more delicate, and thus more highly paid, surgeries as well, so more money in the process. Volume is king for making money as a surgeon as well though, you'd make more performing say, five one hour procedures between a couple of hospitals than two more complex surgeries. He was also said to have a God complex according to some, and apparently owns many properties in England and abroad, so cash was definitely a probable motive.

Good! Doctors are expected to uphold an OATH. One of which is not to do harm to a patient. Intentionally scheduling unnecessary procedures so you can pocket money off your patients, or intentionally fucking up so the patients have to come back for more procedures is so fucked up. Lock him the fuck up, and get rid of his medical license for good. And I never understood if surgeons (Maybe depending on state/country?) get money themselves. I thought the hospital gets the money from the patient, and the money the hospital gets is paid to surgeons on a yearly salary or hourly wage.

i think it works similar to here in the uk. i've worked with a doctor who wrote management plans for patients who didn't need it just for the extra cash he got paid for writing them. never had a doctor performing surgeries for extra money but i can tell you they get a fuckload of money from medicare for doing operations.

in general, doctors are incentivised to intervene even when a better course of action would be to do nothing. success allows doctors to advance their career - a doctor that takes no action (and the patient is better for it) isn't recognised. personally I think we should recognise doctors that refuse to take action more, because not doing something is often as important as doing something this problem is a lot more common than people realise, because a lot of doctors can point to "the patient got better" or "it was treating a legitimate problem" when a patient with the exact same issue (who didn't have surgery) recovers perfectly well. adding in a surgery only increases the risk of something going wrong

Huh. 'Unnecessary operations'? [quote]Paterson, 59, operated on nine women and one man after falsely telling them they had breast cancer.[/quote] Eat all of the dicks. All of them.

[QUOTE=MuTAnT;52295642]That's monstrous beyond words and I can't believe money would be his primary motivation for this. I don't expect he'll reveal his reasons though. What's just as shocking from the article is that he continued to operate for years despite complaints and concerns from staff and others.[/QUOTE] I don't know how it works in the UK, but if it works anything like it does in the US, money would be the most-likely motivator. Many doctors there are paid on a 'fee-for-service' basis - if a patient comes in with a broken leg, the doctor isn't paid to simply fix the leg; instead, they are paid for almost every distinct thing that they do - every little test they do etc. It incentivises overtreatment - the more tests that the doctor performs (even when they are unnecessary), the more they are paid. It's one of the reasons why American healthcare is so expensive per capita. I assumed doctors in the UK would be paid with a different system, such as salaries or bundled payments, but I don't know. I believe that doctors in Australia are paid via the bundled payments system; if a patient comes in with a broken leg, the doctor is paid a flat rate to fix the leg, regardless of however few or many tests that they perform.

[QUOTE=Toybasher;52296249]Good! Doctors are expected to uphold an OATH. One of which is not to do harm to a patient. Intentionally scheduling unnecessary procedures so you can pocket money off your patients, or intentionally fucking up so the patients have to come back for more procedures is so fucked up. Lock him the fuck up, and get rid of his medical license for good. And I never understood if surgeons (Maybe depending on state/country?) get money themselves. I thought the hospital gets the money from the patient, and the money the hospital gets is paid to surgeons on a yearly salary or hourly wage.[/QUOTE] And people are supposed to tell the truth so help them god on the stand during a trial. A set of words doesn't mean jack shit to a lot of people, only money

[QUOTE=Toybasher;52296249]And I never understood if surgeons (Maybe depending on state/country?) get money themselves. I thought the hospital gets the money from the patient, and the money the hospital gets is paid to surgeons on a yearly salary or hourly wage.[/QUOTE] For private consultants in the UK they'll charge their surgical fees to the insurance company and the hospital will charge their own theatre fees separately. Private consultants are basically self-employed and their only form of income will be from the consultations and surgeries they do. In the NHS though, the consultants are paid by the hospital. Source: I work for the UK's largest private insurance company.