Evils of Sham Peer Review Exposed in the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons

/EIN News/ -- TUSCON, Ariz., June 02, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Unlike good-faith peer review intended to ensure good patient care, the intent of sham peer review is to inflict maximum harm on the physician victim, in pursuit of power, control, or money, writes Lawrence Huntoon, M.D., Ph.D., in the summer issue of the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons. Dr. Huntoon is a court-qualified expert in sham peer review.

Perpetrators of sham peer review will often do “whatever it takes to destroy a good physician,” Dr. Huntoon states, even “lie under oath at peer review hearings.”

Sham peer review often involves a collaborative effort with others, including those in hospital administration. This, he explains, “has the effect of mitigating individual responsibility.”

The methods used are remarkably similar case to case. The process frequently starts by attempts to discredit the physician, as by spreading false rumors prior to the attack, he writes. Perpetrators may simultaneously engage in gaslighting in an effort to cause the targeted physician to lose confidence in himself. In one case, a physician’s home was illegally entered, windows were opened that had previously been shut, and things inside his home were moved from one location to another. The hospital subsequently portrayed the physician as psychiatrically impaired and sought to compel him to obtain a psychiatric evaluation, Dr. Huntoon writes.

Physicians may experience time-pressure coercion, or attacks may be strategically planned when physician is on vacation or caring for a sick family member. Some have faced false charges filed with law enforcement, Dr. Huntoon reports. He also recounts six cases in which a box cutter blade was inserted into a physician’s tire with the intent of causing catastrophic failure at high speed.

Physicians have been forced to undergo costly, unwarranted psychiatric evaluations after complaining about patient safety issues. This can destroy a physician’s career and drive him to early death, in Dr. Huntoon’s experience.

These tactics are evil, Dr. Huntoon concludes, and ethical physicians have a duty “to identify them when they are being used to harm a physician colleague and to speak out against them.”

The Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons is published by the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS), a national organization representing physicians in all specialties since 1943.

Contact: Jane M. Orient, M.D., (520) 323-3110, janeorientmd@gmail.com