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Michael Dube, MD
University of Southern California Medical Center Los Angeles

JAMA. 1992;268(24):3429-3430.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text PDF and any section headings.

To the Editor.

—I was pleased initially to see the recent article on the NPDB¹ in JAMA. I thought I might finally be informed of the details of the function and operation of what many physicians consider a "Big Brother" approach to monitoring the practice of medicine. While it is certainly a laudable goal to improve the identification of "bad doctors," I am very concerned about the methods used and the extreme potential for abuse.

The article states that the main reason to create the NPDB was to prevent incompetent doctors from moving around (ie, from state to state) to avoid sanctions. It is also clearly stated that another body does this, the Federation of State Medical Boards. This is as pertains to licensure actions, which is certainly the foremost concern. So it would appear that the NPDB was formed for other reasons.

The authors go on to state . . . [Full Text PDF of this Article]

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