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Board Examines Hospitals' Failure to Report Misconduct

Posted on: Wednesday, 20 July 2005, 00:00 CDT

pjnyden@wvgazette.com

The state Board of Examiners for Registered Professional Nurses is investigating why supervisors in several hospitals failed to report instances when Robert G. DeBoard, a registered nurse, allegedly molested male patients, including a minor and a blind man.

DeBoard worked at HCA River Park Hospital in Huntington as a mental-health technician between July 1998 and May 2000. The hospital also paid his tuition for him to receive a nursing degree while he was working there.

DeBoard was fired by HCA because he "sexually assaulted employees and patients, including a minor patient," according to a lawsuit filed in October on behalf of B.R., one of the patients DeBoard allegedly abused.

DeBoard's assault accusations extended only to inappropriate touching.

In December 2003, about four years after HCA fired him, the nursing board suspended DeBoard's privileges.

The board's action resulted from a sexual assault DeBoard allegedly committed earlier in mid-2003 against B.R., a patient at Putnam General Hospital, another HCA affiliate at the time.

B.R.'s lawsuit notes Putnam General Hospital hired DeBoard in 2003 as a registered nurse "despite his having been terminated by several hospitals for sexually assaulting patients and employees."

Jeffrey Mehalic, a Charleston lawyer, and Keith George of Robinson & McElwee are representing B.R.

Their lawsuit charges HCA River Park "did not report and has not reported DeBoard to any law enforcement agency or to the West Virginia Board of Examiners for Professional Nurses."

DeBoard also worked as a registered nurse at HealthSouth Rehabilitation Hospital in Huntington from November 2000 to March 2001, and again from December 2002 until May 2003.

In between his stints at HealthSouth, DeBoard worked at Charleston Area Medical Center in Charleston from June 2001 to April 2002.

"During his tenure at CAMC, DeBoard sexually assaulted multiple patients," the B.R. lawsuit alleges. CAMC became "aware of these assaults," including one against a blind man, but did not report them to the nursing board.

After leaving CAMC, DeBoard went to work as a registered nurse at St. Mary's Medical Center in Huntington in April 2002. But St. Mary's terminated him on Nov. 22, 2002.

Today, the nursing board wants to know why no one from St. Mary's reported DeBoard's misdeeds.

Last Tuesday, the board sent letters to Joseph Trader, who was clinical manager of emergency services, and Regina M. Campbell, who was director of emergency services, at St. Mary's Hospital when DeBoard was terminated.

The nursing board letters mention that St. Mary's officials sent DeBoard a letter after terminating him, stating, "The complaints that we have received suggest that you have been conducting yourself in a manner entirely inconsistent with the hospital's philosophy and mission."

The letter noted DeBoard did not refute any of the charges against him.

Last week, the nursing board asked Trader and Campbell to explain why "you failed to file a complaint with the board regarding the above allegations and termination."

The July 12 letters indicate Trader and Campbell could be disciplined because of their failure to report DeBoard's activities.

Tammy Knight, a nursing supervisor at Putnam General when B.R. was a patient, testified earlier this year, in a Jan. 26 deposition, that Frank Molinaro, then chief executive officer at Putnam General, told her not to report DeBoard's misdeeds to the nursing board.

Knight said Molinaro told her "he was taking care of it . . . as far as the investigation part of it goes. I would assume that he wanted to handle [it] to keep it as quiet as possible . . ."

"He handled a lot of things that he, as the CEO, shouldn't have handled that I should have handled," she added.

Molinaro also told Knight not to talk to B.R. about what had happened to him, she said.

But Knight ended up filing a complaint with the nursing board herself in July 2003.

During her deposition, she stated, "It doesn't take the CEO to write a complaint. If me, as a staff nurse, if I witnessed something ... that is wrong, I can do that."

In his lawsuit, B.R. asks for unspecified damages from Putnam General and HCA, because they "failed to discover and/or failed to attempt to discover" DeBoard's earlier misdeeds and terminations.

Last week, Mehalic said Putnam General and Molinaro were given an early opportunity to settle the case, but refused.

"By not settling, he [Molinaro] forced us to make our case and we discovered all the other instances of molestation by DeBoard. If we had settled, there wouldn't have been any of this investigation.

"All of his victims were males of varying ages, from a boy of 13, to B.R. in his 20s, to men in their 40s and 50s," Mehalic said. "Most of the victims were disabled, or sedated or unable to see."

To contact staff writer Paul J. Nyden, use e-mail or call 348- 5164.

Source: Charleston Gazette, The

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