The Steward Health Care Vultures: Third World Medicine

Maybe it's not a representative sampling, but folks have offered comments condemning the Steward Vultures.

Several have commented about the failure to notify patients that their health insurance will no longer be accepted until they appear for an appointment. This frequently creates embarrassment and a HIPPA violation since the issue is discussed for others to hear.

Several have commented about the excessive marketing that includes large envelopes of glossy brochures and automated phone calls that don't cease without response. This borders on harassment and one victim will disconnect her land line to end the obsession Steward has.

Steward Health Care seems to have contact information for each facility which includes a 'patient advocate,' amounting to little more than a meaningless pat on the head.  

While my detergent allergy may seem trivial, since my complaint was essentially dismissed, others have offered their experiences.

One friend commented that a detergent allergy triggers an asthma attack.
Taken one step further, let's say that my friend is transported to a Steward Facility by ambulance.

The linens in the ambulance would have the same detergent residue present and would trigger an asthma attack, complicating the purpose of the emergency transport.

Another friend sneezes from detergent residue.
Picture this patient, post-surgically SNEEZING!

Another friend was awake all night, scratching madly, after her husband purchased a laundry detergent 'on sale.'


A friend, who was recently tortured by a Steward Facility discovered:

the wrong surgery was entered in her pre-operative notes
pre-op sedative was denied
the 'resident' wrote a prescription for a non-existent dosage of narcotic painkiller
snarky and rude nurses, one too busy on her cell phone with her son to pay attention to the patient
the rude nurse had the ability to override the surgeon's instructions
discharged with no post-operative instructions
and much else

This friend will provide a lengthy blog entry as soon as she recovers from the torture endured at Steward.

Please consider your health care decisions seriously. You might want to re-think Steward that promises 'World Class Health Care,' but neglected to tell you it was 'Third World Class Health Care.'

How did we allow these vultures into the Commonwealth?


If you've been subjected to Steward abuse, you might consider complaining - it won't get corrected otherwise --

COMPLAINTS:

Include your Primary Care Physician
Include the 'patient advocate' for each individual facility - it won't accomplish anything because they don't really care, but they should be included

Department of Public Health

Complaint, 2nd Floor

99 Chauncy St.

Boston, MA 02111

The Joint Commission

Office of Quality Monitoring

One Renaissance Blvd.

Oakbrook Terrace, IL 60181

Masspro

245 Winter Street

Waltham, MA 02451

MA Dept. of Mental Health

Clinical and Professional Services of Licensing

25 Staniford St.

Boston, MA 02114-2575

MA Board of Registration in Medicine

200 Harvard Mill Square, Suite 330

Wakefield, MA 01880

The AG has been overseeing Steward's finances.

It would seem that these are  'consumer' issues.

Office of the Attorney General
Public Inquiry & Assistance Center (PIAC)
One Ashburton Place
Boston, MA 02108


If your complaint is short, you can file online here:
http://www.mass.gov/ago/consumer-resources/consumer-assistance/consumer-complaint.html

[There's supposed to be a separate health care complaint section, but it wasn't working when attempted.]