Everything2
Near Matches
Ignore Exact
Full Text
Everything2

National Medical Enterprises

created by Civil_Disobedient

(thing) by Civil_Disobedient (5.6 y) (print)   ?   (I like it!) 1 C! Mon Dec 18 2000 at 14:05:49

A chain of more than a hundred psychiatric hospitals operating from the 80's until the early 90's with less than altruistic motives (ie. for-profit). In less than a decade, NME had made billions of dollars by misdiagnosing teenagers with mild cases of depression and then holding them against their will in asylums until their insurance coverage ran out. Several doctors would recieve kickbacks if they referred troubled teens to the program.

Accounts of brutality include months of "chair therapy" (sitting facing a wall for as much as 12 hours a day), electroconvulsive therapy, and solitary confinement without light for months -- all against the will of the patient.

Soon allegations of fraud finally made the Justice Department see the light. In several cases patients would get their diagnoses changed to increase potential revenue for the company (alcoholism might pay $10,000, but depression would get $50,000). The stakes were significanly raised when Dr. Stuckey, a high-ranking NME member and main whistle blower, died alone on his boat under mysterious circumstances shortly before giving evidence to the House of Representatives in 1992. NME finally settled for $379 million dollars -- the largest in American history. One former chief executive of an NME hospital was also convicted of threatening the life of a former manager, writing: "The value of your life decreases every day. We have your address. So expect company one dark night when you least expect it. Your life is worthless now."

Afterwords, the company changed its name to Tenet, and is still one of the largest healthcare corporations in the world. As recently as 1999, the Federation of American Hospitals started a grassroots movement to oppose an expanded "Whistleblower's Act" in Congress. The Federation happens to be a powerful special interest group dominated by the two largest healthcare corporations in the U.S., one of whom is Tenet.

Capitalism at its finest.

printable version
chaos

National Pharmaceutical Stockpile
Y'know, if you log in, you can write something here, or contact authors directly on the site. Create a New User if you don't already have an account.
  Epicenter
Login
Password

password reminder
register

Everything2 Help

Cool Staff Picks
Look at this mess the Death Borg made!
With all the advances in technology it still takes 3 days to clear a cheque
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Forgotten things in space
Great Depression
Playfair Cipher
Manfred von Richthofen
fake plastic anything
Abu Ghraib Prison abuse scandal
Food in the Middle Ages
We are using the machines to steal it all back again
The Grand Inquisitor
The Rise of Christianity
Charles Dickens
New Writeups
antigravpussy
One fly amonst many(person)
sam512
Moon Base Shackleton, 1978(fiction)
Pavlovna
toy boy(person)
XWiz
tear jerker(review)
Heitah
Anarchy is Order(idea)
jessicaj
July 26, 2008(dream)
Berek
ABBA(person)
devolution
k-hole(place)
Nadine_2
The Sound Of Madness(review)
Twin Eclipse
Conversations with God: An Uncommon Dialogue(idea)
SwimmingMonkey
Conversations with Fo Fo- the Loneliest dog in Purgatory(fiction)
locke baron
lynx(thing)
Simulacron3
Reality, Dimensions and the Natural Ontology(essay)
SubSane
Making Love to a 9-Foot Woman(person)
Ouzo
Thoughts(idea)
This affordable entertainment brought to you by The Everything Development Company