Quality Assurance

WASHINGTON -- A Lockheed Martin Corp. Titan IVB rocket's failure to put a $800 million military communications satellite in the proper orbit April 30 stemmed from faults in testing, quality assurance and software development procedures, the Air Force said yesterday.The process didn't find and correct a software programming mistake made in early February by a software engineer for the No. 1 defense contractor's Denver-based astronautics sector, the Air Force said."The error went undetected by both the internal quality assurance processes and the independent verification and validation process," said the Air Force.

The state health department will launch an HMO quality assurance unit, Dr. Martin P. Wasserman, the state health secretary, said yesterday."We've always had the responsibility for quality, but we had read the statute narrowly in the past," Wasserman said.Last year, he said, he decided that a "more expansive" reading of the department's authority was "consistent with what everybody wanted us to do."The new unit will divide the work of monitoring health maintenance organizations with the Maryland Insurance Administration, which has a complaint unit and, under a new law effective this year, a hearing process for determining if HMOs are denying medically necessary care.

New positionsMcCormick names Fajardo quality assurance directorMcCormick & Co. has appointed Raul F. Fajardo as director of quality assurance. He will lead the quality assurance managers' group responsible for developing and implementing improvements to the Sparks-based spice maker's quality system. Formerly with Nabisco Foods, he is a member of the Institute of Food Technologists and the American Society for Quality Control. The Westminster resident is a native of Cuba and a graduate of Michigan State University.

New positionsMcCormick & Co. names Lawrence vice president of quality assuranceMcCormick & Co. Inc., the Sparks-based spice company, selected Roger T. Lawrence as vice president of quality assurance. The Timonium resident is a DePaul University graduate and is a member of the American Society for Quality Control and the American Institute of Chemical Engineers.Koscher, Milliken appointed to posts at Sheraton HotelThe Sheraton Inner Harbor Hotel has appointed Jon Koscher general manager and Sandra Milliken account manager.

HERE'S WHAT we know so far about how health care fares in a free market. Competition does not reward high quality. Instead, it rewards low cost.I don't mean to suggest that cost-saving dooms first-rate medical treatment.Efficiency can serve quality, as long as the medical judgments are truly made in the patient's interest.But you can't be sure that's always the case. Employers pick health plans based on service and price. They may get assurances of quality from the plans that bid for their business.

The National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA), which accredits HMOs and other health plans, announced yesterday it had selected HCIA Inc., the Baltimore health data company, to sell its performance and accreditation information on about 250 health plans."

New positionsCertified Network Systems appoints Baranick presidentCertified Network Systems & Services has promoted Annemarie Baranick to president of the Gaithersburg-based data and voice communications networks design company. She will retain her position as chief financial officer as well as oversee daily operations. Baranick previously was vice president of finance and administration for Terminal Networks Inc. of Silver Spring.Hearth & Home promotes Setree to presidentHearth & Home Distributors, headquartered in Columbia, named Jim Setree president.

The state's medical discipline board has suspended a Baltimore gynecologist's license to practice medicine pending further review of 12 patients' allegations of sexual misconduct.The patients accused Dr. Mohammad R. Farzanfar, a doctor in practice for 30 years, of trying to sexually arouse them after conducting Pap smears, pelvic exams and other medical procedures.One patient quoted Dr. Farzanfar as saying he "was waiting to do this for years," while another said the gynecologist wanted to know why her husband couldn't satisfy her. Several of the women said they had been patients for many years before Dr. Farzanfar did anything inappropriate and that his conduct began to change in the last few years, according to documents released by the state board.

A Japanese-owned company that makes highly sensitive measuring equipment will hold a grand opening Tuesday for a newly built customer training center at its Columbia plant.The $5 million, 46,000-square-foot facility at Shimadzu Scientific Instruments Inc. contains classrooms, hands-on teaching laboratories, conference rooms, offices, a quality assurance laboratory and warehouse space.The grand opening begins at 11 a.m. and will feature some the corporation's original scientific instruments from its 119-year history.

A Gaithersburg doctor accused of treating his patients with sex and drugs and claiming he was God said he committed "serious transgressions" and offered no defense yesterday at a state hearing into whether he should lose his license.Dr. Robert A. Hallowitz, a family practitioner who specialized in the treatment of chronic fatigue syndrome, later told reporters that he felt "remorse." He said he hopes that if he loses his license, it will not be for long."I have committed serious transgressions against a very few of my patients," Dr. Hallowitz read from a handwritten statement as he stood with his lawyers outside the Office of Administrative Hearings in Lutherville.

Israel H. "Sonny" Weiner, a retired Lutherville neurosurgeon who had been president of the Maryland Board of Physician Quality Assurance, died of cancer Sept. 11 at Seasons Hospice at Northwest Hospital Center. The longtime Stevenson resident was 82. Born in Baltimore, the son of a hardware store owner and a homemaker, Dr. Weiner was raised in the city's Park Circle neighborhood. He was a 1945 graduate of City College and served in the Navy from 1945 to 1946. He earned a bachelor's degree in 1949 from the Johns Hopkins University.

CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield launched yesterday a new program designed to reward physicians for practices that improve patients' health - an approach it believes could ultimately lower medical costs. CareFirst, the region's largest insurer with about 3 million members, said it would pay doctors as much as 7 percent extra for meeting a variety of standards of care. Those measures are a mix of process (if women get needed mammograms), service (if there are weekend or evening hours) and outcomes (if patients lower their cholesterol)

K Bank announced that Roger Lee joined the Owings Mills-based bank as senior vice president of commercial lending. He formerly was a vice president and loan officer with Mercantile Safe-Deposit & Trust Co. Mid-Atlantic Business Finance Co. appointed William B. Freeman Jr. as vice president of operations. He is responsible for underwriting loans for presentation to the company's board and the U.S. Small Business Administration. Education Goucher College appointed Marc M. Roy as the Towson liberal arts college's provost and chief academic officer.

CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield launched yesterday a program to pay doctors as much as $20,000 to install electronic patient records systems designed to reduce medical errors and allow for more precise tracking of the care patients receive. With the program, CareFirst joins a growing "pay-for-performance" movement in which insurers and employers seek to provide incentives for doctors to provide better care. A number of other participants in the recordkeeping bonus plan were also announced yesterday, potentially covering 2 million patients in 10 states.

Repairs close Obrecht, Freter roads, Stoney Lane The Carroll County Department of Public Works has announced road projects for this week. For information about projects, contact Carroll County Bureau of Engineering at 410-386-2171: Storm drain installation: Gorsuch Road and Center Street roundabout; Penn Hill Road in Valley Hill Farms. Closed for reconstruction (local traffic only): Obrecht Road from White Rock Road to Route 97. Closed for bridge reconstruction: Stoney Lane; Freter Road (at the bridge)

Sen. Paula C. Hollinger said last night that she has reached an agreement with the state's medical lobby on a bill to change the way doctors in Maryland are licensed and disciplined. For weeks, the Baltimore County Democrat has been locked in a battle with the Maryland State Medical Society, known as MedChi, over her efforts to make it easier to punish bad doctors. Hollinger and other lawmakers say the standard of proof is too high, which leads to too few disciplinary actions. Currently, a case against a doctor must be proven through "clear and convincing evidence."

Sen. Paula C. Hollinger said last night that she has reached an agreement with the state's medical lobby on a bill to change the way doctors in Maryland are licensed and disciplined. For weeks, the Baltimore County Democrat has been locked in a battle with the Maryland State Medical Society, known as MedChi, over her efforts to make it easier to punish bad doctors. Hollinger and other lawmakers say the standard of proof is too high, which leads to too few disciplinary actions. Currently, a case against a doctor must be proven through "clear and convincing evidence."

Susan Abbott, an executive at McCormick & Co. and a leader in the spice industry, died of breast cancer Friday at Brightwood Center in Lutherville. The Cockeysville resident was 54. In her 32 years with the Baltimore-area grocery products company, Ms. Abbott became the senior technical supervisor at its spice mill and headed its quality assurance program. She was most recently McCormick's vice president for regulatory and environmental affairs, and was the first female president of the American Spice Trade Association.

When several Baltimore city school principals complained that they had too little time to do far too much, Alan E. Small could have brushed it off as a commonplace gripe that he, as an internal auditor, could do little to resolve. Instead, he sketched out a sheaf of flowcharts, documenting the schools' chain of command and the number of staffers who reported directly to each principal. After sharing his findings with school system authorities, Small drew up new flowcharts that reassigned many of the schools' business activities, from managing bookstores to equipment inventory, to new chairpersons.

By law, Maryland essentially allows its doctors to police themselves - and that has resulted in a relatively low rate of disciplinary actions against physicians, at least one national study shows. The Medical and Chirurgical Faculty of Maryland - the state's medical society and the main lobbying arm for Maryland doctors - controls two-thirds of the seats on the state regulatory board that oversees physician discipline. MedChi members also play the determining role in investigating alleged cases of substandard care and, by virtue of their control of the Maryland Board of Physician Quality Assurance, in deciding whether disciplinary actions should be taken.