This is a very real, and disturbing possibility that brings into light the way women’s medical issues are treated differently than men’s medical issues.

I hope that he is wrong and that it is just a case of no one thought to make complaints about his behavior.

There are so many different unrelated aspects of this whole story including:
The issue of the government paying women for children they can’t support on their own
The issue of one particular physician being allowed to run unchecked
The issue of the potential of IVF as a whole to result in high order multiples
The issue of a person using willful initiation of an adverse event to capitalize on the press’s willingness to pay for a story
The issue of doctor’s power to decide who should be allowed medical assistance to become a parent

It will be interesting to see if there have been OFFICIAL past complaints sent to the board on Dr. K and how they were handled.

His practices, if the allegations are true, are, well, shady.

Kellie Toothman will file a complaint with the Medical Board of California against Dr. Michael Kamrava — and wants to tell as many people as she can.

Every field has it’s good and bad. There are bad teachers, bad lawyers, bad politicians, even bad priests and bad nuns. It’s sad. Alas, the American people are no better protected against them than they are against bad RE’s.

I agree with you that deceptive practices and advertising by RE’s can “prey on vulnerable patients”, but there is some hope on the horizon in that the spread of information via the internet can help improve transparency everywhere, including in this field.

I totally disagree with you on the part about lawyers successfully policing themselves to prevent there from being unscrupulous lawyers in this country. In fact, I am of the opinion that there are far far more unscrupulous lawyers than unscrupulous RE’s, even percentage-wise. (Actually, I don’t think you said that. Sorry) You merely stated that lawyers have established rules by which they must abide. We do too. One of the hospitals where I have privileges is among the strictest in overseeing physicians.

One of the reasons I started this blog was to help empower patients with more information. I get feedback from patients from far away who say that the information here helped them make better decisions. For now, I’ll keep trying to do my part. I encourage patients to do theirs as well.

Lawyers, oddly enough, have very strict standards of conduct, and reporting requirements for breeches of professional canons by other members of the profession.
Overseeing bodies investigate and discipline members, in fairly transparent proceedings.

Would that this medical specialty would work to act responsibly in the creation of new life, and to avoid preying on the vulnerable patients seeking reproductive technologies.

Kamrava_2 The Beverly Hills doctor who helped Nadya Suleman conceive octuplets also provided fertility treatment to a 49-year-old woman who is pregnant with quadruplets and is hospitalized at County-USC Medical Center.

Further down:
“I do think it is concerning, and dangerous, especially to the mother,” said one doctor with knowledge of the case. “She is close to 50. When women get to be that age, our fear is the cardiovascular complications, such as stroke or heart attack. That’s how serious this is.”

The woman in the latest case arrived recently at Good Samaritan Hospital for treatment but was transferred last week to County-USC because she lacks insurance, the sources said. Doctors placed her on bed rest until the birth of the babies, which, they added, could be two or three months from now.

So there is ANOTHER case this doctor has provided the tax payers with.

Here’s the REAL kicker:
Kamrava could not be reached for comment and has declined previous interview requests. A woman who answered the phone at his West Coast IVF Clinic said, “If [a] mother wants to bring four kids, so what?”

Honestly Dr. Lee, this man is a criminal. He MAY not have broken the law (although he certainly has breached standards of care) but his man is a MORAL criminal who is bad bad bad for your profession and is bad bad bad for all of us who have to foot the bill! And his “treatments” end up in DANGEROUS pregnancies both for the mother and the children.

I am MORTIFIED.
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2009/02/the-beverly-hil.html

I am willing to police my OWN actions and be held accountable if I show any pattern of poor judgment and I’m all for punishing those who deserve punishment.

It is a little trickier for me to monitor my competitors because that would be like a girl telling a guy that she likes, “Hey don’t date THAT OTHER GIRL, because she is evil and dishonest and high-maintenance. You should go out with me instead.” There would be potential conflict-of-interest clouding the opinion. If I were to quit working and my sister wanted to do IVF in Southern California, I would very strongly warn her about certain RE’s who are unethical, marketing-savvy scam artists. However, if the general public were to ask me, I would have to cautiously temper my comments. Does that make sense?

I am however intrigued on PGD. My husband and I tried IVF with PGD 4 times to overcome my husband’s balanced translocation. One chemical pregnancy resulted. We tried one more time and skipped the PGD even though we were counseled on the low chance. (there were quite a few other variables as well on this attempt, for the 4 other I was travel from CA to MD to cycle) My daughters 1st birthday is in 11 days. My pregnancy started off as twins (we transferred 3 embryos) and by 10 weeks one had stopped developing (her brother is celebrating his 1st birthday today, surprise chance to adopt 11 days before I delivered)

Now I have to go turn off the news before I hear how much of my tax dollars will be paying for someone else’s family.