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Court favors hospital report to practitioner database

Quality Improvement Monitor, March 24, 2005

An Illinois appellate court recently ruled that a hospital was not in contempt when it failed to void a report it made to the National Practitioner Data Bank (NPDB), reversing a lower court's ruling.

The Illinois Second District Appellate Court ruled the Health Care Quality Improvement Act (HCQIA) preempted a trial court's finding of Provena Hospitals in indirect civil contempt for failing to retract a report it made to the NPDB regarding Evelyn Diaz' voluntary surrendering of her privileges while a peer review investigation was pending. The court imposed upon the hospital a monetary penalty of $500 per day for the first 14 days of noncompliance and $1,000 per day thereafter.

The court ruled that the HCQIA required the hospital to report Diaz' failure to renew her privileges and that the trial court lacked the power to order the hospital to violate federal law.

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