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Israel's medical complaints system updated

Israel is to revamp completely the process of investigating complaints of alleged medical malpractice–which today takes an average of two years per case, with some taking as long as eight years.

Amendments to the Physicians' Law have already been approved by the ministerial committee on legislation and are due to be approved by the Knesset (Israel's parliament) within a few months, said the ministry's legal adviser, Mira Huebner-Harel. Under the existing system, the health ministry appoints an ad hoc committee of doctors to look into complaints about ethical, professional, or criminal violations; strictly ethical issues are usually transferred to the Israel Medical Association.

But investigations and hearings in the ministry usually get bogged down by bureaucracy, as well as by senior doctors' scheduling problems and reluctance to take time off for poorly paid sessions. The committee's recommendations are finally brought to the health minister, who decides whether the doctor is blameless. If he or she is not, a reprimand or a suspended or cancelled licence will be handed down.

Ms Huebner-Harel conceded that in some cases, by the time evidence is collected, witnesses may have forgotten details or even be dead. Her office receives about 60 new complaints about doctors each year and makes recommendations to the minister in about 40 cases.

Under the proposed system, which has the medical association's endorsement, a three member permanent committee headed by an experienced lawyer and including two doctors close to retirement age will handle all cases. The ministry's legal staff will present the case against the accused doctor. Committee members–who will be paid a respectable, full time salary–will hand down the decision, thus eliminating the minister's involvement and removing personal and political pressures. Any appeals would be handled in the courts.

The Israel Medical Association's chairman, Dr Yoram Blachar, said that under the changes the medical association will be asked immediately to deal with strictly ethical complaints against its members and pass on to the ministry those that involve errors of professional judgment or criminal behaviour.

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