According to a new USA Today report, state medical boards failed to take any disciplinary action against thousands of physicians found to have committed misconduct that put patients at risk. The report reviewed records from the National Practitioner Data Bank, a database that tracks incidents of medical malpractice, among other things. The investigation revealed that, from 2001 through 2011, nearly 6,000 doctors nationwide had clinical privileges restricted or revoked for misconduct involving patient care. Of those, however, more than half had no disciplinary action taken against them by their state medical board. Even the most serious of that group – those physicians found to be an immediate threat to health and safety – were not sanctioned. The report also detailed several extreme instances where specific doctors were repeatedly paying out money to resolve medical malpractice claims over long stretches of time, yet were never sanctioned by their state medical boards, and continued to practice medicine with unrestricted medical licenses. According to the authors of the USA Today report, these findings paint a grim picture of the current physician oversight system.