TIDE TABLES:

CHAIRPERSON: 
Frederick G. Schechter, MD 
FACS, FACC,  FAAST, FACPM
VICE-CHAIRPERSON: 
Magdalene J. Chrulski, RD, LD
SECRETARY: 
Florence M. Hoot, RN. MS. CDE TREASURER: 
Joseph L. Sindone, DPM , FACFS

Mr. Winston Hamilton
Executive Director
(772) 873-4879 
page at (772) 343-3380

   A tax-exempt community-based corporation currently soliciting support for educational projects,  personnel salaries,  community screening, patient identification, and  training programs. The Coalition was initially funded by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and administered by the Florida Department of Health. 

**On December 13, 2001 the Coalition was  notified by The Blue Foundation for a Healthy Florida that we are recipients of a two-year grant of $123,672 "...to support a community outreach demonstration program for diabetes education." The Diabetes Coalition of St. Lucie County, Inc., received the second highest grant awarded in this first funding cycle of the Blue Foundation for a Healthy Florida. 

THE  2003 DIABETIC TEACHING CONFERENCE ISLAND WAS A ROUSING SUCCESS. 
CONGRATULATIONS TO THE VOLUNTEER COALITION WORKERS WITHOUT WHOM THIS COULD NOT HAVE BEEN ACCOMPLISHED!

Dr. Schechter resigned as Chairman of the Board of Trustees January, 1, 2004 to allow him and his wife, Roberta, to relocate to Las Vegas, Nevada.

A euphemism for rationed or denied health care.
"I think the real way to break the powerful grip of the insurers is through massive political organization of both patients and doctors." 
David C. Murphy, Ph. D.

Field-Testing a toxin on 
our Teen-agers.
Corporate Hubris & Governmental Apathy

Vendors continue to ply our youth with a Dangerous Addiction

Devoted to Screening, Diagnosis, and Treatment.

Information for Patients and Physicians

 THINGS TO THINK ABOUT!!
Is your surgeon fully trained & certified by the American Board of Thoracic Surgery?

Will a "TEAM" of  Physicians consisting of  an Oncologist, a Radiotherapist, a Surgeon, and your Family Physician be discussing your case and presenting you with treatment options? Options which will give you BOTH long-life and comfort!?

"I feel Fine!"  How do I find out if I have cancer?!  What are the risk factors?!  What are the Symptoms?

"I stopped smoking-am I still at risk?!"  

"I already have cancer of the lung-what does it matter if I continue to smoke?"  

"How about asbestos exposure?"

Medical Staff-Hospital Administration-Board of Trustees Relationships.

Medicare, State, and Accrediting Agencies: Physician and Hospital Compliance issues.  
Are they improving the quality of Patient care or is this a means of the agencies justifying their own existence? 

Do Hospital  Boards and Administrators act to restrict financial losses? 
Is it possible that a corporation  that owns 200 hospitals cannot influence government and oversight agency representatives??
LAY BUREAUCRATS, HOSPITAL ADMINISTRATORS, & HOSPITAL BOARDS OF TRUSTEES  are RESTRICTING Physicians in their primary role as patient advocates!

Gross incompetence and apathy of Boards of Trustees (BOTs), coupled with the myth that it is they who hire and fire the CEO, perpetuates the ineffectiveness of corporate hospital BOTs. In a striking example, the BOT practices plausible deniability when Medical Staff Officers present peer review and quality data to the BOT, even to the point of ending meetings prematurely to avoid hearing negative information. Tort law does not, however, allow a BOT the luxury to deny knowing about anything, since it is the BOT's responsibility to know everything. Defining Physician Staff Officers as unable to fully participate in this process in an active productive and professional manner develops into an antigenic response to Physician leaders at any and all levels. Corporate profit-taking depends on perpetuating the ignorance of lay members and intimidated professional members of the BOT, the willingness of the Medical Staff to accept and sign-off on just about any 50 page document (not having the time or inclination to read the document with reflection), and the joint BOT and Medical Staff ignorance of State and Federal Statutes, PRO guidelines, and JCAHO rules. Again, the Physician iconoclast, independent thinker, self-educator, and self-decision maker is thought not to fit in the MBA consensus paradigm of decision making-it is a testimony to the insecurity of those who need a committee to make decisions which are obvious and intuitive to those who are the best and the brightest and best educated in health care, the Physicians!! It is the well-motivated Physician who has the wherewithal to be the creative leader. Witness the Bureaucrats trying to squeeze medical experience and practice into a mathematical model, to predict outcomes with certainty when biologic phenomena occur on a bell-shaped curve. They have the turf but not the talent!!

10/15/02 10:39:27 AM MST