By DANIEL LATHROP Fida highlight, highlight, bold
Staff Writer
Published: 18 September 2013 11:01 PM
Updated: 19 September 2013 01:43 PM
The Texas
Medical Board has fined a McKinney heart doctor for implanting unnecessary
stents into cardiac patients, according to records released by the board.
A medical board panel found that Dr. Taysir Jarrah had performed improper
procedures in at least 10
cases at Heart Hospital Baylor Plano and that
his “incompetence” was
“likely to harm the public,” according to the order fining him.
Jarrah, who declined to comment, agreed to pay a state fine of $3,000 and must
take eight hours of classes on record
keeping and two hours of classes on medical
ethics, an order
approved Aug. 30 shows. His license has not been suspended.
The case came to light when a hospital employee reported
concerns about Jarrah’s performance of stent procedures to managers,
hospital spokeswoman Nikki Mitchell said.
An investigation at the hospital found that Jarrah performed 21 surgeries “without
any documentation of the clinical basis for the procedures,” according
to the state order.
The Plano hospital suspended his privileges and
reported him to authorities, and the state then launched its investigation. The
hospital did not confirm the date of those actions but said he hasn’t done a
procedure at the hospital since October 2011.
Jarrah was a
shareholder at the doctor-owned hospital but hasn’t been since April
2012, Mitchell said. He also resigned his privileges, according to the medical
board order.
The stent procedure involves inserting a tube into
weakened or blocked arteries to restore blood flow and prevent future heart
attacks and aneurysms, according to the National Institutes of Health. It is
not considered an invasive procedure.
Since the hospital’s investigation into Jarrah, it
has begun conducting reviews of every proposed heart catheterization, Mitchell
said.
Jarrah’s patients were invited to meet face-to-face
with top hospital officials, who have had 20 such meetings, Mitchell said.
“All monies related to Dr. Jarrah’s potentially
medically unnecessary procedures were immediately refunded to Medicare,
Medicaid, the patient and/or their insurer and all refunds were made by March
of 2012,” she wrote in an email to The Dallas Morning News.
About the same time Baylor suspended Jarrah, he lost his privileges at Texas
Health Presbyterian Hospital Allen because he was not board-certified,
Texas Health spokesman Wendell Watson said.
Most specialists are board-certified in their
field, but it is not always a requirement at hospitals.
Jarrah continues to have privileges at
other area hospitals, meaning he still can perform procedures on
patients. As part of his agreement with the state, he will be temporarily monitored by another doctor.
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