46.3% of Florida hospitals reported no bad doctors over 17 years

Almost half of the hospitals in Florida never reported having a problem with any doctor over a 17-year period, according to a report released Thursday. Public Citizen, a Washington watchdog group, said 105 of 227 Florida hospitals had never filed a complaint from 1990 through 2007 with the National Practitioner Data Bank, the federal group that keeps track of problem doctors nationwide. The report's authors said the reason for the low number was the clubby atmosphere in which the healthcare industry protects its own.