Editor,
I’d like to rebut two of the hospital’s statements made in The Record’s article on Wednesday.
1. Statement: Whidbey General Hospital’s spokeswoman said Dr. Mark Borden’s behaviors led to his removal from the hospital’s emergency room, and that the hospital also terminated Borden’s membership and clinical privileges.
Facts: Dr. Mark Borden, our exceptional Emergency Department director, was presented with written demands in 2011 that he publicly stated “violated my civil rights, my personal ethics, and my Hippocratic Oath.” He resigned rather than be forced to violate his principle of “do no harm” to patients. It was well after he left the hospital that his privileges were terminated, and that was for being a community activist and standing up for quality health care in his community.
Our ex-CEO acknowledged that Mark is an “excellent physician.” For our hospital to spend almost a quarter-million dollars on a personal vendetta is saddening. Mark continues to save lives off-island, and to raise his family and farm his land just outside of Coupeville.
2. Statement: Whidbey General Hospital’s spokeswoman said that my public documents requests “were very broad and while we attempted to work with Mr. Born to narrow his requests, we were rarely successful.”
Facts: Each time I submitted a request, I added: “If any request will cause you considerable time or expense to track down, please let me know, and I might be able to reduce or cancel the request, as I do not want them to be an undue burden to you.” My requests were narrow, not broad, often consisting of asking for a single readily locatable document. These were also clearly documents any citizen is entitled to, so paying attorneys to scrutinize each request was money wasted.
I’m astonished by the amounts of money the hospital threw away on trying to silence two critics, whose aim was, and is, only to improve healthcare on Whidbey. The lesson for today is to make sure we don’t return to the hospital’s past ways — bullying, intimidation and persecution.
ROB BORN
Greenbank
