Doctor sues for alleged unlawful termination of hospital privileges

Dr. Gary Ramsey, a former medical staff at the Commonwealth Healthcare Corp., has filed a lawsuit in federal court over the alleged wrongful termination of his medical privilege at CHCC.

Ramsey is suing CHCC chief executive officer Esther Muña, CHCC OB/GYN department chair Dr. Jeanolivia Grant, CHCC Medical Affairs director Dr. Sherleen Osman, former Department of Public Health Secretary Joseph Kevin Villagomez, CHCC, the CNMI government, and 10 unnamed others.

Ramsey, through counsel Stephen Woodruff, is suing them for unlawful deprivation of property without due process of law, unlawful deprivation of liberty and property without due process of law, breach of contract, tortious interference with contract, violation of U.S. and CNMI constitutions, and breach of covenant of good faith and fair dealing.

Ramsey is demanding unspecified damages, attorney’s fees, and court costs.

According to Woodruff, the doctor is entitled to an injunction prohibiting defendants from refusing to recognize his valid hospital privileges at CHCC.

Ramsey is a physician and surgeon specializing in obstetrics, gynecology, and women’s health. He first came to work on Saipan in April of 1999. He worked at the Commonwealth Health Center from 1999 to July of 2007. He then worked for the Department of Public Health for two and a half years as medical director of the Wise Women Village project, a federal grant program, until September 2010.

In November 2009, Ramsey applied for hospital privileges at CHC. After a month, all the required signatures for approval of his privileges had been affixed to the application.

Woodruff said that Villagomez did not refer the approved privileges back to the Medical Executive Committee and refused to issue a letter to Ramsey confirming his privileges at CHC.

He said Ramsey’s privileges were not finally recognized until two years later when confirmed by the then CEO, Juan N. Babauta. It took eight more months for Ramsay to actually get a job using the wrongfully delayed privileges, Woodruff said.

Ramsey’s privileges were reportedly valid until Jan. 1, 2014, yet a second incident of illegal and wrongful deprivation of privileges occurred in 2013, Woodruff said.

On Oct. 4, 2013, Woodruff said, Ramsey was notified that he was no longer considered to have hospital privileges and that he was no longer allowed in the medical records department.

“This show of force occurred in the medical records department, causing embarrassment to plaintiff,” the lawyer said.

In an email to plaintiff later that same afternoon, Muña confirmed the suspension of privileges. Woodruff said there was no legal authority or legitimate purpose in Muña’s action to withdraw Ramsay’s hospital privileges or to send four hospital staffers to force him off the hospital’s premises.

Woodruff said that emails Ramsay sent to the medical chief of staff and to the vice chief of staff as well as a memorandum to the Medical Executive Committee asking about the suspension of his privileges never received a response.

Toward the end of October 2013, Ramsay began the process to renew of his hospital privileges but as of January 2014, his application was still being improperly held up, Woodruff said.

He said Ramsey provided notice of this to the attorney general in February 2014.

“The AG made no response to plaintiff, either in person or through counsel, to the notice of claim,” Woodruff said.