Several key lawmakers said they plan to introduce legislation in the coming session to address concerns about the state’s oversight of physicians and other licensed professionals.

The calls for change follow a three-day Honolulu Star-Advertiser series last week that detailed numerous shortcomings in the regulatory system , ranging from a sluggish disciplinary process to a lack of transparency.

Among the newspaper’s findings were cases in which physicians lost their credentials in other states because of misconduct but were able to keep their Hawaii licenses for months, or even years, while the state pursued disciplinary action. In some cases, including several that are pending , the doctors continued to treat Hawaii patients.

Rep. Della Au Belatti, chairwoman of the House Committee on Health, called the newspaper reports stunning and said she intends to introduce legislation in the session that starts in January to deal with concerns raised in the series.

“Clearly, there are serious issues that need to be addressed,” Belatti said.

Sen. Rosalyn Baker, chairwoman of the Senate’s Committee on Commerce, Consumer Protection and Health, also said she intends to introduce legislation, noting that some concerns relate to lack of resources while others are statute-based.

“There is always room for improvement,” Baker said, referring to issues that affect the boards for all licensed professionals, not just doctors, who are regulated by the Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs.

Sen. Josh Green, the only practicing physician in the Legislature, said he would support measures to increase public protection and make the oversight system more transparent.

Green described as crazy those cases uncovered by the newspaper in which physicians lost their licenses elsewhere because of misconduct but were able to continue practicing in Hawaii for long periods before local regulators took action. “I definitely think they should clean that up,” he said.

The senator also said it was outrageous that physician assistants who had separate expunged California convictions for statutory rape and planning a home invasion were able to get unrestricted Hawaii licenses but were denied credentials in California. Both cases were highlighted in the newspaper series.

In the first case, the applicant eventually obtained a conditional license in California on his third try — four years after his first attempt.

Hawaii law does not allow licensing boards to consider expunged convictions of any kind, while California boards can consider such convictions if the underlying offenses directly relate to the duties of the job for which a license is sought, the newspaper found in its “Ailing Oversight” series.

“If there’s any question that patient safety is at stake, we should be able to consider expunged convictions,” said Green, a Big Island emergency room physician.

Dr. Christopher Flanders, executive director of the Hawaii Medical Association, the trade group for local physicians, expressed similar sentiments about expunged convictions.

“Getting a license to practice medicine is not a right, it’s a privilege,” Flanders said.

He also said that if a doctor loses a license in another state for reasons directly related to patient care, it would be reasonable to suspend that physician’s Hawaii license until the Hawaii Medical Board, the panel that decides discipline matters, determines a more permanent course of action.

Flanders said his organization has long been concerned about the time DCCA takes to resolve complaints against doctors. Whether the complaints are frivolous or have merit, the process takes too long, he said, and the problem relates to a lack of funding.

The Star-Advertiser series revealed that the state’s efforts to handle medical complaints in a timely fashion, though improved since a decade ago, still frequently fall short when dealing with Hawaii-licensed physicians who have been sanctioned in other states.

The newspaper found dozens of cases in which the medical board imposed discipline more than two years after the physician was sanctioned elsewhere. Some of the cases dragged on even though the other states declared emergencies to justify their action to immediately suspend a license.

Representatives of other states told the Star-Advertiser that reciprocal discipline cases typically are much easier to process because another state board already has investigated the underlying facts and determined a sanction was warranted. Unlike Hawaii, the other states rely largely on the first state’s discipline order to take action.

In examining cases since 2000, the newspaper found that a lack of resources contributed to the slowness of Hawaii’s system.

While the number of licensed professionals that DCCA regulates has surged nearly 70 percent over the past two decades, its enforcement staff at the Regulated Industries Complaints Office has shrunk by 14 percent. Licensing fees also have not been raised in about 25 years, and the department is struggling with databases that are roughly 30 years old.

Ahlani Quiogue, executive officer of the medical board, said in a written statement to the newspaper that DCCA considers whether emergency action is warranted in all cases.

She noted, though, that the department is working with the board on proposed legislation to expedite the disciplinary process when a doctor has been sanctioned in another state.

“The bill would authorize the board to issue an order when it receives evidence of out-of-state disciplinary action, a tool that is currently available in other jurisdictions but not in Hawaii,” Quiogue wrote.

In that area, Belatti said she would like to see Hawaii become more in line with best practices in other states.

Baker said legislation should be considered giving the board the power to automatically suspend a license if that physician has been deemed ineligible to practice in another state because of egregious misconduct. The automatic suspension would be in place while the board weighs what action to take next, she said.

Hawaii already has a law that allows the board to summarily suspend a physician’s license to prevent an immediate and unreasonable threat to personal safety or fraud on the public. It was adopted in 2013.

Green, who sponsored that legislation at DCCA’s request, said he believed the law gave the board the authority to issue summary suspensions in cases involving revocations or suspensions elsewhere while the panel considered whether more permanent action was needed.

If that law needs to be tweaked to allow such action, it should be, according to Green and Belatti.

“Additionally, we have to look at more enforcement positions if we want better oversight,” Rep. Angus McKelvey, chairman of the House Consumer Protection and Commerce Committee, wrote in an email to the Star-Advertiser.

Belatti also said the medical board should be able to consider expunged convictions for offenses that directly relate to the position for which a license is sought. She expects to address that issue in proposed legislation as well.

Belatti likewise said DCCA should be providing more information on its online physician profiles — an area the newspaper found particularly lacking in transparency.

“If it’s the law causing the hindrance, then yes, we should change the law,” she added.