Brinton made headlines after he sued Intermountain Health Care for canceling his hospital privileges at Utah Valley Regional Medical Center and Orem Community Hospital. According to court documents, the hospitals charged that some of the doctor's hysterectomy patients suffered complications, that a misdiagnosis may have contributed to a baby's death, and that he delivered more babies than was safe. The case eventually went to the Utah Supreme Court, where Brinton lost.

The Supreme Court never looked at the merit of the allegations the hospitals made, Brinton says. It focused simply on whether a hospital had a right to deny privileges as long as it had an established process and followed it. Because he lost privileges at IHC hospitals, his application at Mountain View in Payson was originally denied. When he appealed the decision to the hospital, he won. He has never been disciplined by DOPL.

Loss of hospital privileges doesn't automatically trigger DOPL disciplinary action. Between 1991 and 2003, the federal data bank shows that Utah hospitals reported 17 physicians had lost hospital privileges — but only eight of these doctors have ever been disciplined by DOPL, according to the data bank.

DOPL doesn't know how many of the 7,500 physicians licensed in Utah actually practice here, in part because doctors often have licenses in more than one state. When a doctor gets in trouble in one place, it may take a while for another state to find out, so scrutiny is delayed.

In the spring of 1994, six weeks after he surrendered his license in Idaho in the midst of disciplinary proceedings, Dr. Bradley Spaulding got a job in Utah, where he also had a license, as Milford's only surgeon. The Idaho investigation accused him of providing care in an emergency room "while under the influence of drugs."

Although he was not yet on DOPL's radar, Spaulding soon got in trouble in Utah. Spaulding had told officials at Milford Valley Memorial Hospital about his drug problems and his treatment, but the hospital assumed it was past history. When Spaulding relapsed, the hospital took drastic steps to restrict his access to drugs and the hospital pharmacy. Six months after his move to Utah, DOPL ordered a "quality review process" of his clinical skills and required him to write his prescriptions in serially numbered triplicate.

DOPL revoked Spaulding's Utah medical license in 1997. According to DOPL files, for several months he had been writing patients prescriptions for painkillers that he then used himself.