By Jon Cox, BAKERSFIELD.COM
A Bakersfield obstetrician-gynecologist has been ordered to stop practicing medicine, at least temporarily, after he failed a competency exam following accusations of negligence.
The Osteopathic Medical Board of California revoked Dr. Hans Yu’s certification effective June 23, but it stayed the action and placed him on probation for five years on the condition that he pass a competency test, whether oral or written.
Yu later failed the exam, prompting the board’s executive director, Erika Calderon, to ban him Jan. 2 from practicing medicine until he passes the test.
She ordered him to wait three months before taking the exam again. If he fails two more times, Yu will have to wait a year before retesting. He may not practice medicine until he passes.
Yu, whose office is at 9730 Brimhall Road, Suite 1, first received his board certification in August 2006. He and his Bakersfield attorney did not respond to requests for comment.
On Thursday, Dignity Health removed a page on its website stating Yu was “accepting new patients.” Afterward, in response to an inquiry by The Californian, the company sent an email stating “Dr. Hans Yu is not a practicing physician at Mercy & Memorial Hospitals.”
Records posted on the board’s website show Yu has been charged with gross negligence and repeated negligent acts.
Formal charges brought by the state Department of Justice on the board’s behalf say Yu was accused of not personally evaluating or updating an obstetrical patient when the patient was hospitalized to induce labor.
He was also accused of ordinary negligence regarding a second obstetrical patient whose ureter was injured during an emergency peripartum hysterectomy, according to board records.
The records refer, as well, to three acts of ordinary negligence regarding a third obstetrical patient whose pregnancy ended in a full-term intrauterine fetal death.
The board’s summary said Yu acknowledged he did not order fetal non-stress testing as recommended by a maternal-fetal medicine specialist for the third patient. But it said Yu characterized his care and treatment of the patients as “otherwise appropriate and within the standard of care.”
Despite his contentions, according to the board summary, “clear and convincing evidence proves the charge of gross negligence regarding the first patient, and the charge of repeated negligent acts regarding all three patients.”
Consumer Watchdog said by email this week that pregnant mothers in the Bakersfield area have experienced “a lot of confusion” about the case.
The Los Angeles-based consumer advocacy organization said that, as part of an agreement with the board, Yu was required to transfer patients to other local OB/GYNs.
A news release from Consumer Watchdog said it worked with families for five years to encourage them to come forward and file death and lifelong harm complaints against Yu. It said they have continued to work with the organization to move their complaints through what it called a complicated enforcement process.
“This action taken by the Attorney General’s Office and the Osteopathic Medical Board was fueled by a people-powered campaign for justice,” stated Michele Monserratt-Ramos, Kathy Olsen Patient Advocate at Consumer Watchdog.
She added, “This latest disciplinary action would not have occurred without the work of families across Bakersfield who filed complaints, participated in medical board meetings, and testified before the Legislature.”
