Planned Parenthood manager: staff poorly trained putting patients in “unnecessary danger”, mgrs had serious deficiencies

MONDAY 7/30/2013: Former Planned Parenthood manager Melody Meanor and two nurses said they will testify today at a legislative hearing in Wilmington that Planned Parenthood failed to inform as many as 200 women that they tested positive for gonorrhea and chlamydia, and failed to notify 87 women of results of their colposcopies.

Joyce Vasikonis and Jayne Mitchell-Werbrich are the former clinic nurses who earlier testified about unsafe and unsanitary conditions at Planned Parenthood’s Shipley Street clinic.

The three former employees also will discuss how Planned Parenthood placed patients in “grave danger” by relying on employees who had little or no medical credentials and “rushed through abortions at a speed that made patient safety unsustainable,” according to a news release announcing the hearing.

TUESDAY 7-30-2013
Concerns toward Planned Parenthood voiced at hearing: The Planned Parenthood of Delaware’s Wilmington clinic came under scrutiny early this year when several abortion protesters noticed an unusual number of ambulances called to the Shipley Street site. Former workers spoke at a hearing Tuesday. 7/30/13

H/T

A former manager at Planned Parenthood of Delaware’s Wilmington clinic spoke publicly for the first time today about problems she experienced at the troubled clinic, joining two former clinic nurses who complained to state officials last year.

Melody Meanor, who managed the clinic’s health center for three months in 2012, called for justice for women who were treated there by personnel whom she says were poorly trained, working in disorganized conditions and routinely skipping important elements of patient care.

She urged women treated there to seek outside medical attention to see if they had conditions that went unreported by clinicians at Planned Parenthood of Delaware, putting patients in “unnecessary danger.”

Meanor said entry-level health center assistants were poorly trained. She said two managers had serious management deficiencies. Untrained assistants were assigned duties they were not prepared to perform, Meanor said.

Meanor said she had done such training in Wyoming, where the clinic she worked in excelled in organization and operations.

She said during her brief tenure, she found scattered patient files and expired protocols. She saw no evidence of data collection, she said, and said the clinic was violating grant guidelines – borrowing against grants to cover payroll expenses.

No documents were offered to substantiate Meanor’s claims.

Meanor repeated the nurses’ concerns that hundreds of women were never told that they tested positive for sexually transmitted diseases and others did not receive medication necessary to protect future pregnancies. She said she was directed to falsify records and alleged that a manager destroyed some records.

She rejected published statements by Planned Parenthood of Delaware CEO Ruth Lytle-Barnaby that the clinic’s operations had become a political issue and that two former nurses – Jayne Mitchell-Werbrich and Joyce Vasikonis – were doing the bidding of anti-abortion groups.

All three women say they are pro-choice and raising concerns only for the sake of patients and patient care.

“But I had to do some soul-searching,” Vasikonis said. “Some of these things brought me to my knees…. As a nurse, I had to do something about it.”

She said she is now a client of the Colorado-based Alliance Defending Freedom, that describes itself as a conservative Christian organization, advocating “religious liberty, the sanctity of life, and marriage and family.” Her attorney there, Michael Norton, has filed a complaint with the Delaware Board of Medical Licensure and Regulation, she said.

The clinic came under scrutiny early this year when several abortion protesters noticed an unusual number of ambulances called to the Shipley Street site. Five women required emergency care after procedures.

Mitchell-Werbrich and Vasikonis reported their concerns to the state in 2012, but state officials then said they could not substantiate the claims. The federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration cited the clinic for several violations, though, and this year the clinic’s primary physician, Dr. Timothy Liveright, surrendered his license to practice medicine in Delaware after regulators pursued claims against him, calling him a “clear and immediate danger to the public” because of unprofessional, incompetent and negligent conduct. Liveright has denied the claims.

Mitchell-Werbrich and Vasikonis say “unsafe and unsanitary” clinic practices put women in “grave danger.”

Meanor said the clinic was cited and given “conditional” certification by the Planned Parenthood Federation, which knew of concerns related to unsafe, unsanitary conditions.

As a trained social worker, Meanor said she spent time with patients, explaining the seriousness of abortion and trying to ensure they understood the procedure, wanted to have it done, and were not being pressured by someone else.

“Many of these women are poor or minority women who had turned to Planned Parenthood of Delaware in their moment of need,” Meanor said.

In an interview with Delaware Online, Planned Parenthood former employee, Joyce Vasikonis says that Planned Parenthood is arrogant and “they seem to believe that whatever they do no body can do anything about it.” She went on to say that there was no area in the Wilmington or the Dover Planned Parenthood office that ran like it was supposed to.

Delaware Attorney General Beau Biden’s office also filed a complaint against Dr. Timothy Liveright, a doctor who performed abortions at the Wilmington clinic. The state accused Liveright of unprofessional, incompetent and negligent conduct and argued that he presents “a clear and immediate danger to the public.”
Liveright, who has surrendered his license to practice medicine in Delaware, has denied the state’s claims and said he was a “scapegoat” for the clinic.

MORE on PP of Delaware here