Would YOU Speak out about Glen Rose Medical Center Safety Issues? Update Turk v Ray Reynolds & Somervell County Hospital District case 10/4/2016Somervell County Salon-Glen Rose, Rainbow, Nemo, Glass....Texas

Would YOU Speak out about Glen Rose Medical Center Safety Issues? Update Turk v Ray Reynolds & Somervell County Hospital District case 10/4/2016

4 October 2016 at 1:07:15 PM

salon

Last update before this.

What is this case about? Dr Turk, according to the letter I got through open records back in 2014, attempted to get both Ray Reynolds, CEO of Glen Rose Medical Center and board members of Somervell County Hospital District's attention about some serious safety issues. His wife, Shelley Turk, also spoke out about hospital safety concerns. They allege in a civil lawsuit they filed in August of 2015 that

Defendants violated Plaintiff Albert J Turk's and Shelley Turk's constitutional right to free speech. Defendants also violated Albert J Turk's right to due process and due course of law. Additionally, Defendants violated both Plaintiff's right to petition the government for redress of grievances. As to Albert J Turk, MD, Defendant Somervell County Hospital District also violated the Texas Open Meetings Act.

.....

Plaintiffs have repeatedly spoken out about urgent matters of public interest in regard to the operation of the public hospital facility known as Glen Rose Medical Center. Their outcries were made to numerous persons and entities, starting first with a substantial history of verbal presentations to management and otherwise internally seeking corrections to unsafe and dangerous practices at Glen Rose Medical Center, s well as seeking implementation of new and better practices, especially where instances of neglect or lack of training resulted in adverse patient outcomes, including what appeared to Plaintiffs and others to be premature deaths. When the history of speaking out internally to management did not results in any substantial improvements, Plaintiffs began to make written and verbal outcries to a number of addtional persons and entities, including but not limited to elected members of the Board of Trustees of the Somervell County Hospital District, the Glen Rose Medical Center Hospital Medical Staff Committee, the Texas Department of State Health Service and the media. When the Joint Commission on Hospital Accreditation investigated Glen Rose Medical Center as a result of the report of another healthcare professional, Shelley Turk also spoke to the Joint Commission's investigator at length.

....

The retaliation against Plaintiffs for speaking out about these and other issues escalated after Plaintiffs turned to external reporting. Plaintiff's work environment became openly hostile. Plaintiffs have been repeatedly told that they never should have advised Somervell County Hospital District board members or the Texas Department of State Health Services of their concerns. To give an example, in response to a verbal outcry about retalition, Plaintiff Shelley Turk was told by the Hospital Committee Chief of the Medical Staff that she and Dr Turk brought the retaliation "upon themselves"

(READ THE WHOLE CASE AT LINK ABOVE)

TMZ-style, because the public should get to follow along with what's going on with this freedom of speech case, which case records are listed where anyone can read with a PACER account.

Who are the expert witnesses and discovery materials that have been designed by the Turks?

Interesting that there is a supplemental designation of testifying expert, Richard Hoeth, filed on Sep 26 2016. Who is he? connected to TORCH. -Readers of Somervell County Salon will remember that, via an open records I did, I posted the letter from Dr Albert Turk regarding Glen Rose Medical Center safety issues in which he also references TORCH. He was the one who wanted to bring TORCH in to help the hospital as he also alerted them regarding some serious safety issues at Glen Rose Medical Center. As is noted in this post from October 8, 2014 Ron Hankins vigorously defended voting against the agreement in late September 2014 (if you watch the video, ignore the boors in the audience who appear to have been brought up in a barn).As Dr Turk said at the time in his letter

When the representative from TORCH came in he recommended making some of the same changes that I had been requesting for years. I was hopeful that this would force Ray to make these changes but it appears that he is fighting against them vigorously. The representative from TORCH has said that he has never had an administration that didn't readily welcome him to come in and help much less fight against it so vehemently. Regardless, he has stated that he believes he can work with Ray to help him improve as a hospital CEO if Ray will allow this to occur.

This leads me to several question. Why is Ray Reynolds fighting against the changes recommended by the expert? Why is the hospital board no longer unanimous in their support of TORCH?

From the court document filed on Sep 26, 2016

On the docket are several entries *mooting* various motions. The court says "If either party believes that issues raised in this motion remain unresolved, they are invited to file an appropriate motion to that effect".

Plaintiffs Motion to Compel filed 4/20/2016 was mooted. I'm not an attorney but wonder, did the defendants ever actually do depositions for Ray Reynolds and Chip Harrison. Also, did the defendants ever give over the discovery materials requested?