St. Vincent CEO: Employees fired over Pressly records

By The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

St. Vincent Health System fired between two and six employees last month for improperly accessing the records of Little Rock morning television anchor Anne Pressly while she was still alive and a patient at the company's main hospital, St. Vincent President and CEO Peter Banko confirmed Wednesday morning.

Banko said that while Pressly, 26, was a patient at St. Vincent Infirmary Medical Center in Little Rock, a routine patient-privacy audit showed that as many as eight people had gained access to her records improperly. An investigation found that at least two had valid reasons for viewing the records.

"The others, and I won't say how many exactly, the rest we terminated immediately on the same day," Banko said. "I will say it was more than one."

Pressly, who was an anchor with KATV in Little Rock, was found unconscious in her bed on the morning of Oct. 20. She died five days later at St. Vincent.

Police are still searching for a suspect.

Read tomorrow's Arkansas Democrat-Gazette for full details.

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