By Kathleen Acuff
 Bough |
Deciding to “move on,” the El Camino Hospital Board of Directors last week dropped further scrutiny of a possible conflict of interest on the part of their chairman, agreed to clarify their policy and promised to rebuild trust.
The questions investigated by Vice Chairman David Reeder and Director Mark O’Connor were whether Dr. Edward Bough profited from inside information when his cardiovascular practice bought a 64-slice CT scanner from Siemens Financial Services soon after the hospital bought a 16-slice scanner from the same company, whether running tests on the scanner put his medical practice in competition with the hospital and whether he disclosed the purchase in a timely manner.
The hospital’s 16-slice scanner went into operation last February. The following month, Bough’s practice, Cardiovascular Institute (CVI), located about 1,000 feet from the hospital, began looking into buying a 64-slice scanner. CVI signed its scanner contract with Siemens in August. Bough disclosed the purchase to the hospital board in October. The hospital board voted in November to upgrade the hospital to the more powerful equipment and, last week, approved an additional $5 million in general obligation bonds to help pay for leasing it and other Siemens medical equipment.
Reeder, presiding at last week’s meeting, said, “I’m not comfortable with board members competing at this level with the hospital.”
A third party, Optima Imaging, has determined that CVI paid fair-market price for the 64-slice scanner. Bough told the board last week that his practice uses the scanner only for cardiovascular tests that are not being conducted by the hospital.
“We could use our better machine in competition with the hospital” but decided not to, he said.
After nearly two hours of discussion and hearing the opinions of two attorneys, directors voted 4-0 March 1 to establish an ad hoc committee of two directors and one nondirector physician to work with the hospital’s legal counsel to clarify the conflict of interest policy.
