February 17, 2011
By Staff Reporter
Patricia Donnelly spoke this week of her shock at Limerick-born Cregan’s death on St. Patrick’s Day following cosmetic surgery performed by a doctor whose medical history was littered with malpractice suits.
“When I read that article, my heart sank. I felt awful. She didn’t need to die,” said Donnelly, a resident of Howard Beach, whose four-year-old grandson Harry died on the operating table in 1997 during a routine operation to remove his adenoids place tubes in his ears.
Following her grandson’s death, Donnelly teamed up with New York mothers Caren Catinella and Ilene Corina, whose children also died from complications during minor surgeries.
Their tireless campaigning led to the passing of the “Patient Health Information and Quality Improvement Act,” in 2000 by Governor George Pataki. The law gives members of the public free access to a physician’s professional history, including education, hospital report cards and details of any malpractice suits taken against them.
If Cregan had logged on to www.nydoctorprofile.com and looked up Dr. Michael Sachs, the surgeon who performed her surgery in his Manhattan office, she would have seen clearly the list of 33 malpractice payments he had made within the past decade.
She would have read that Sachs had been: “precluded from performing complex nasal procedures except when assisting, or assisted by, a surgeon who is either Board-Certified by the American Board of Plastic Surgery, or Board-Certified by the American Board of Otolaryngology, who has completed a fellowship in facial-plastic surgery and who has at least ten years of experience and expertise in performing such complex procedures.”
For a fee of just $3, Cregan could have ordered a full copy of his medical record.
“This is a lifesaving resource. Doctors literally get away with murder,” according to Donnelly.
Dr. Michael Bergstein, who performed the surgery on Donnelly’s grandson, was recommended by the family’s pediatrician. No disciplinary was taken against him following Harry’s death and, like Sachs, he continues to practice today. In 1999, he was rated among the “Best Doctors in New York,” by New York Magazine.
Donnelly is agitating for increased public awareness of this law, which empowers patients to choose physicians based on work history rather than peer evaluation.
“It’s a landmark law, but it hasn’t been promoted because the doctors hate the fact that its there,” she said.
“It’s a New York law, not a national law and lots of doctors advertise outside the state.”
The weak dollar rate has encouraged many U.S.-based surgeons to advertise cosmetic surgery procedures in the European market at attractive rates. Cregan reputedly contacted Sachs after reading about his work in Ireland’s “Sunday Independent” newspaper.
“I spent every single day of my life for five years getting this law passed,” said Donnelly, who was named a “Woman of Distinction” by the New York State Senate in 2001.
“I want people in Ireland to know about it too. If Kay Cregan had known about it, she would still be alive today.”