26 November 2011

22,848,733 Reasons To Fire Yocasta Brugal & The SJBullshitters

In 2002, the San Juan Bautista Medical Center was awarded $5,986,306.

In 2003, the SJBMC received a $6,233,513 grant.

In 2006, the SJBMC received another grant, this one for $5,660,545.


In 2007, the SJBMC received a $4,968,329 grant.

It seems that the 2002 award was deemed a good start and the 2007 award was the crashing end. (Kind of like what happened with the accreditation thing.)

So what happened with that $22,848,733?

Let's close a circle around that question, shall We? For comparisons in funding, between 2000 and 2008, the SJBMC received exactly four federal fund awards, for the total of $22,848,733 over that span. Now granted (pun intended), this is not revenue with a lot of profit, but it does denote an institutional ability to get jobs done.

In that time span, tracking only the two other private medical schools in Puerto Rico, you will find the following awards:

2000:
Ponce School of Medicine -- $5,008,075.

Universidad Central del Caribe Medical School -- $6,092,289.


2001:
Universidad Central del Caribe -- $550,289 and $5,576,264.

Ponce School of Medicine -- $5,317,538.


2002:
Universidad Central del Caribe -- $237,740 and $332,844 and $7,765,360.

Ponce School of Medicine -- $7,672,536.


2003:
Universidad Central del Caribe: -- $208,935 and $251,951 and $7,584,175.

Ponce School of Medicine -- $7,417,070.


2004:
Universidad Central del Caribe -- $262,394 and $392,541 and $6,349,547.

Ponce School of Medicine -- $8,045,161.


2005:
Universidad Central del Caribe -- $358,970 and $6,972,037.

Ponce School of Medicine - $5,793,999.


2006:
Universidad Central del Caribe -- $5,994,906.

Ponce School of Medicine -- $7,088,814.


2007:
Ponce School of Medicine -- $5,220,078.

Universidad Central del Caribe -- $6,505,781.


2008 (only Quarters 1 & 2):
Ponce School of Medicine -- $497,469.


Over the same time span, the other two private medical schools in Puerto Rico had at least the following totals:

Ponce School of Medicine:  $41,735,127 (averaging $5,216,890 a year).

Universidad Central del Caribe:   $55,436,323 (averaging $6,092,297 a year).


So SJBullshitters: What happened to that money stream?



What happened with the federal fund stream that pumped $22,848,733 into the SJBMC over a 5-year period?


Why did the federal fund stream dry out around 2007, when the School received its accreditation? 

How is it that the School listed for the LCME Status Report (covering 2010 data) only $78,220 in federal funding for 2010? Yet it also declared a total revenue of $7,657,164, with $5,319,348 in expenses, leaving a gross profit of $2,337,816.


What happened to that profit, SJBullshitters?


While the other medical schools add $5.2 million and $6.1 million a year to their revenue stream, the SJBullshitters can only claim $78,220 for one year. No wonder the School gets 70% of its revenue from students: Brugal MenDacious and the SJBullshitters fucked up the SJBSOM's federal funding potential.


So how did they do it? Could it be that the SJBullshitters--as a commenter suggested--were caught commingling funds, robing Sam to pay Pedro, or Enrique or Marta or someone who shouldn't have been paid with federal funds? Or did they violate some other financial, legal and/or ethical standard? Again?


And another thing: how bad is the SJbullshitters' incompetence? Even when they were allowed to compete for federal funds, they were unable to match the other local private medical schools in leveraging the three huge advantages they share for federal funding:


1) A region with higher poverty levels than almost anywhere in the States.

2) Minority (Hispanic) status, with the concomitant sociocultural angles.

3) Unique (in the U.S. of part of A.) socio-economic demographics and health-care infrastructure.

[I'm not saying these are good things, only that they are relevant to every aspect of procuring federal funds.]



How much would $4 million a year, less than the other two schools average, help the SJB School of Medicine? How much would it have helped to avoid the precarious situation the School has been since 2007, culminating in the loss of accreditation? Why isn't that funding making a difference now? 


Because these questions are fundamentally relevant to firing the SJBullshitterss, We have to ask Brugal MenDacious and her lying liars, loudly, insistently and with ferocious intensity: What happened to take the reality and potential of federal funding away from the SJBSOM?




The Jenius Has Spoken. 




[Update: 28 Nov 2011: San Juan Bautista Hospital employees protest that their jobs are about to be terminated under the new deal with the Menonita Hospital group. At this time (5:44 PM), no SJBullshitter has responded to either employee requests for information nor provided a written response to a local TV news department (WAPA-TV), as they said they would. Lying liars need to be hit. Hard.] 

25 November 2011

If True, Then Kick Yocasta Brugal & The Board Out NOW

From the Comments to My previous post Stiff Yocasta Brugal & Her Lying Liars concerning the situation at the San Juan Bautista School of Medicine (SJB):

One little known fact is that the chairman of the Board Aracelis (sic) Roque hired her son to be the lead attorney for SJB...  


Feds are looking into a commingling of funds problem...  


Fraud, misrepresentation lawsuits being prepared, SJB has to be taken over in order to survive, the name should be changed and a new identity given by a reputable institution of higher learning.


The anonymous commenter has left Us with a few points to ponder. Let's take the first one, that the Chairman of the Board of Trustees Aracelys Arroyo de Roque hired her son to work with the SJB.

First of all, Arroyo might be the Chairman of the Board, but she's listed only as a member of the Board (along with legendary golfer Chi Chi Rodríguez) in the 2008-2010 SJB catalog. That would mean she rose to the Chairmanship after 2007, in other words, after the SJB received its accreditation.

Why is this significant? Because it means that Arroyo has been privy to what the SJB administrators, particularly Yocasta Brugal MenDacious, have been saying or doing for the past 4 years, the period covering denied accreditation/granted on appeal/withdrawal of accreditation/placed on probation after appeal. Toss in the Hospital fiasco and you have a log that looks like the last 8 hours of the Titanic...only with barely enough lifeboats.

This places Arroyo in a position of full--let Me repeat that--full responsibility for what has happened in the SJB and for what the SJBullshitters have wrought. If from that position she has committed a serious ethical breach along the lines of hiring her own son to be the legal counsel for the School, then she not only confirms what We've been thinking about the SJB and its pusillanimous Board (and what I've been saying with sneering contempt), she has placed herself and the Board squarely in the argument of "Dump them as part of the SJBullshitters."


Point two. Commingling of funds is not proper financial management, crossing legal and ethical lines. It simply means using money entrusted for one purpose on another.  In the case of the comment above, one needs to stress that federal funds are never--repeat, never--to be commingled. Quoting: "The federal government especially forbids commingling their funds with other funds because they want federal grants to be used only for the purposes intended by Congress... If you do...they will pull the plug on the program and take their money back plus a penalty."


The commingling issue is made very clear at every step of the federal funding process, from RFP to grant award to funding award and subsequent audits. If the commenter is accurate, then We have further potential confirmation that the SJBullshitters did a shitty job with money management and federal funds, causing the School to lose potential monies that nearly every other medical school uses broadly. That incompetence led to decisions like straining already over-used clinical resources by bringing in students from other Caribbean med schools in a desperate search for cash flow...a key issue in the subsequent loss of accreditation.

So is the commenter's closing paragraph any surprise? Is there any doubt that the shadow spasms of incompetence desperate to cover their baboon asses is emerging into sharper focus? And is there any doubt that pushing the SJBullshitters out NOW is the only way to truly correct the chaos?



The Jenius Has Spoken.

24 November 2011

Stiff Yocasta Brugal & Her Lying Liars

Happy Thanksgving! Thank you for visiting The Jenius any day of the year. 



In a surprise announcement, the San Juan Bautista Hospital (SJBH), affiliated in some nebulous way with the San Juan Bautista School of Medicine (SJBSOM), incompetently run by the SJBullshitters (SJBullshitters), reports it is to be purchased by the privately-owned Menonita Hospital Group.

In one action, the SJBSOM's lack of clinical resources could--could--be improved. Given that the School is on probation now, after a fulminating loss of accreditation in early October, strengthening an obvious weak point, a vital component for accreditation, seems like the right move.

Seems.

The Menonita Group purchase of the SJB Hospital might be honest...from the Menonita's side. They currently operate two successful hospitals in nearby Cayey and Aibonito, as well as a handful of clinics in the same areas. A geographic expansion into a larger regional city, albeit with a troubled hospital, is a good move. But is this as clear as it appears to be, the straight-up salvaging of a weak hospital?

Let's be objective:

1) It is possible that the Menonita Group (MG) was already negotiating with Brugal MenDacious before the LCME arrived in March after finding out--from a press report--that the SJBH had filed for bankruptcy in February. Maybe placing it in bankruptcy was part of the "sweetening" of the deal to make the Hospital more appealing to the MG. (It happens.) But if that is the case, and given the enormous weight the LCME gave to the SJB's very weak clinical resources since 2007, why didn't Brugal MenDacious and her lying liars not mention any of this potential deal in their """defense""" of the School's accreditation? 

The Menonita Group would benefit more from the School being accredited, the Hospital would be more valuable to the LCME (for SJBSOM accreditation purposes) under MG than under the SJBullshitter's fecal-foolish follies and the deal could conceivably have bought the School time and not lose its accreditation. Any of these reasons would make at least mentioning the potential deal an absolute must, never mind all three--but only if the deal was already in the works.

2) Conclusion: the MG deal is recent, at least no older than late September. Why? Because the Appeal Panel hearing was in mid-September, and if--a huge "if"--Brugal MenDacious had the brains God gave a gangrenous bone(-headed) tumor she might have anticipated the School getting hammered badly and opened a channel to the MG as early as mid-September. But that would be giving her credit she hasn't shown she deserves. Ergo, the deal dates from after the loss of accreditation letter on October 3rd, meaning that Brugal MenDacious and whatever lying liar she used as a go-between (I'd look to the Board of Trustees on this one...) basically put this deal together in about 6 weeks.

Think about it: if Brugal MenDacious were operating from a basis of honesty and good faith at the (broken) helm of the SJBSOM and Board VP of the SJBH, would she have any reason to not talk about the Menonita Group? If she were operating in the best interests of the SJBSOM and the SJBH--a postulate with about as much evidence behind it as creationism--(a) couldn't she have avoided the loss of accreditation mess and (b) wouldn't the timing of this deal be different, i.e., earlier?

3) Given these premises, doesn't it seem that the deal is not exactly a godsend, but is probably another "trick" in the lengthy "Cover Lying Asses" saga of the SJBSOM and the SJBullshitters? To wit: what did the SJBH and the SJBSOM give up to close the deal? Note I'm not accusing the MG of any wrongdoing; Let's face it, they don't have to do anything even remotely off-center to get this hospital because the urgency is entirely on the other side. It's a buyer's market...and the seller is a desperate group of shitheads.

Did the SJBSOM get a good deal? Depends. The students should benefit from an expected exponential improvement in the Hospital, as well as having additional clinical resources. But is the School better off? What's going to replace the roughly $1.7 million revenue the SJBH gave the SJBSOM, an amount so significant that Brugal MenDacious made a point of including it in the Status Report appeal to "prove" that the School didn't receive 70% of its total revenue from student registration and fees, but only 50%...when the national average is 4%.

What exactly did the SJBSOM give up? What exactly are they hiding with this deal? And for those of you objective (or foolish) enough to ask "Why would they be hiding anything, Jenius?", let Me reply: read every Jenius post and comment made on this issue, as well as the Status Report and other documents. They hid the hospital's bankruptcy. They hid the loss of accreditation. They hid(e) the Status Report. They hid(e) their finances. The SJBullshitters have earned that nickname repeatedly. What makes anyone think they are changing stripes now?

So here's My call: Stiff Yocasta Brugal and her lying liars. (And that's funny because Brugal MenDacious is a forensic specialist, or as Jerry called them, a deadhead. Please feel free to chuckle at leisure.) Students, don't register until Brugal MenDacious and her lying liars are fired. Dumped. Tossed out like garbage. Their argument, and that of their feeble-minded apologists, that the School needs money now that it is on probation is facetious at best and fraudulent at worst. The School always needs money, but a well-run School earns it: no need for begging. And without a trustworthy administration, collecting student registrations and fees for a semester that could knowingly end in disaster is tantamount to theft on their part and outright foolishness on yours.


Put the pressure on Brugal MenDacious and her lying liars. Get her out of her fouled nest before she and her lying liars leave on her own terms, gained at your expense and that of equally-mistreated employees. Do it now...or watch as the whole lying house of cards collapses in the coming months.

As one of My commenters said, in closing: You have been warned.



The Jenius Has Spoken

21 November 2011

Yocasta Brugal: Fire Her Now

In a surprising development, the Liaison Commission on Medical Education (LCME) reversed the San Juan Bautista School of Medicine's loss of accreditation (Public Announcement, 18 November, 2011). The SJBSOM is now under probation, pending a visit by the LCME in late January/early February 2012. The good news: The students, including Mrs. Jenius, can continue or complete their studies under accreditation, a huge academic and professional difference. The bad news: I was wrong about the possibility of a reversal, but I can take that because the right decision was made and I have been right about everything else.

Which brings Us to worst news: Yocasta Brugal MenDacious and her lying liars are still at the head of the SJBullshitters. And the possibility that they will get kicked out on their fat asses anytime soon seems remote. My guess is that they won't be kicked out before the LCME visit and I would LOVE to be wrong about that.

But I won't be.

The reasons to kick these incompetent lumps of uselessness out are legion, and many of them have been detailed in previous Jenius posts and the comments. (Check out "Yocanda Brugal: Incompetence Recognized" for a lengthy comment thread.) There are plenty of reasons, in truth, a veritable excess of plenty of reasons why Brugal MenDacious and her ilk have to go. The disease is diagnosed, the remedy is obvious and has proven quite often to be the successful cure for the disease. But the will to act is missing. And without the will, the action doesn't exist.

The will can only come from two collective minds: the Board of Trustees, a gang of monkeys with the total integrity of a frog's cloaca. Their interests--based on their inaction so far--seem to be deeply intertwined with that of Brugal MenDacious and the lying liars, so the incentive to dump their partner/ally/crony/shield/protector/benefactor is virtually nil.

The second group is composed of the students. If the students raise their voices in clear objections to giving the S.S.JBullshitters back to the captain and crew that piloted the leaky vessel into rocks, eventually that captain and crew will be replaced. Staying silent, acquiescing, granting approval by simply continuing with business as usual will doom the SJBSOM to lose its accreditation in 2o12. And this time, it will be for a very long time. I have absolutely no doubt on that point.

A comment on the post linked above called for the students to refuse to register for classes until Brugal MenDacious and her lying liars leave. Good start. But more needs to be done. There are three flanks to attack:

1) Revenue: Why is the SJBSOM begging for scraps from Antigua and the Dominican Republic?

2) Federal grant funding: Why is the SJBSOM so utterly useless in securing funding that nearly every other private medical school receives in bulk?

3) Clinical services: In a nation with a huge population density and complex widespread health problems, why can't the SJBSOM develop alliances and programs strong enough to secure accreditation?

Here's the crux of the matter: the SJBSOM is a miserable failure as a healthcare resource, and its recent actions prove it is also a miserable failure as a school. For the students, some 30-40 of whom have already chosen to leave, the battle must be seen as more than "getting Mine now": it has to be seen as "getting better for all Our sakes."

The chance to turn the SJBSOM from a pigsty run by retarded barnyard rejects into a worthy institution has to be won now...for if it isn't, if the animal farm is allowed to continue its manure-dumping ways, then the SJBSOM will quickly become shuttered, ignored by everyone as it closes its doors.

At that point, it would be very much like locking the door after the horse is gone, so why don't We focus on kicking the horses' asses out first and then making sure the barn is run by competent people?


The Jenius Has Spoken.

12 November 2011

It's My Birthday!!

Yes. It's that magical tiME of the year (and those who know ME know I MEan "almost all the year") when the world celebrates My Birthday! The cakes have been baked, the candles have been warehoused in hangars (very funny, people) and the chili's hot enough to strip chroME from a new bumper. So We are ready!

What can I say about a year that saw ME get married and be happy? Well, for one thing, I can say: Thank You, Mrs. Jenius! I love you!

What can I say about a year that saw My Son excel in school (MEdals enough to start a museum) and on the basketball court (All Star selection and solid MVP candidate)? I can say: Well done! You're admirable in so many ways! I love you!

What can I say about a year that saw true friends step up and others lose the label "friends" as they pulled away in haste? To My Friends: you're all gifts from the Universe. To the others: I'm giving you back to the Universe. I expect refunds.

What can I say about a year that saw My Family struggle to deal with daily life and eMErge tempered? Family is the heart of a society, and as for My Family, its heart beats strong.

What can I say about a year where My Island sinks ever lower into a morass of violence and corruption? I can issue a warning: the reckoning is coming, jackals. It won't be pretty. For any of Us.

What can I say about life in general as I tack on another digit to My age? That it is tiME for a fundaMEntal change in My life. The groundwork has been laid for Me to move on to new challenges, to wholeheartedly pursue My ambition and push My talents to the utmost.

To My chagrin, I haven't challenged Myself seriously in almost four years. That's just wrong. What's the point of Life if not to tackle new challenges and explore new horizons. "Life is either a grand adventure or it is nothing." Helen Keller said that. And if she could pull that off, why can't I? Why can't We?

So here's to Me, to My Birthday and the chance to whoop it up with loved ones near and far. And here's to facing Life's challenges, from the personal to societal, with verve, will and integrity. It has been--overall--a great year for Me; I can foresee next year being even greater.

Hopefully greater for all of Us.



The Jenius Has Spoken.

10 November 2011

Yocasta Brugal Should be Fired

Yes, I've been fairly quiet lately. Steaming, if you want to know. But I have some announcements to make, so here they are:

1) Yocasta Brugal should have been fired as Head Dissembler of the San Juan Bautista School of Medicine.

2) That the SJBSOM's Board of Trustees has not done that is because they are cowards, "spineless sea cucumbers" I called them, whose lack of integrity is another cesspool in the SJBullshitter's arsenal. (Think about it and you'll agree I'm right. Again.)

3) I have read the LCME's Status Report that triggered the decision to take away the SJBSOM's accreditation in June of this year. Doubt Me? Here's a quote that has not appeared (as far as I know) in the public documents of the case: The financial health of the school of medicine depends heavily on student tuition/fees. Aside from one contract to provide mental health services to the Commonwealth's correctional facilities, there are essentially no other revenue sources.

Furthermore, a quick bit of research indicated that the average revenue percentage a private medical school receives as student tuition/fees is 4%; at the SJBSOM, it was 70%.

Seventy. Percent.

Where are the service contracts for the SJBSOM? Is providing mental health to cons the only thing the SJBSOM is good for? Apparently so, according to Brugal MenDacious.

Where are the federal funds that support research and community-based studies, a bread-and-butter staple of nearly all private medical schools? Is the SJBSOM somehow unable to access these funds? If so, why? Could it be lack of resources? Could it be a lack of initiative, talent, imagination and competence by the SJBullshitters, led by Brugal MenDacious? Or is it that in some way the SJBSOM is barred from seeking and securing federal funds?

Where is the decisive action from the Board of Trustees? Again, quoting Me: "Their job is to ensure that the SJB stays on track, legally, ethically, academically and financially." It is beyond ANY doubt that Brugal MenDacious and her raving band of deluded lunatics have failed to protect the SJBSOM academically. In doing so, they have seriously transgressed ethical bounds, have seemingly gutted the school's finances (the stated "Net Revenue" of the SJBSOM for FY 2009-2010, Total Revenue minus Total Expenditures amounted to $2,337,816--that's gross profits people) and have, through their demonstrable incompetence and venality exposed the School to massive legal action. So why hasn't the Board acted?

Because they are useless. Or they are part of the abject failure. Or most likely, both. "Thick as thieves," as Theodore Hook would say.

Yocasta Brugal should have been fired. Summarily. That "summarily" also goes with "executed" is nothing but a conscious choice on My part.

This coming Monday, the 14th, something called a Dr. Márquez will lead the (cough-chuckle-spit noisily) """charge""" to rescue the SJBSOM from the new Court-ordered Appeals Panel. As the evidence hasn't changed and the primary missions on both sides remain the same as well, I foresee another unanimous bitch-slap against Brugal MenDacious and the lying lumps of lamebrains masquerading as "administrators" and "trustees."

I'd tell these sacks of human waste to "Fix this!" if it weren't for two facts: they will never--never--know how and they never--never--should have made this happen in the first place.



The Jenius Has Spoken.