Auburn Community Hospital has publicly denied allegations of negligence and harassment made by a former employee.

Dr. Gregory Serfer filed the lawsuit late last week with concerns going back years.

“We believe that these assertions are unproven allegations made by former employees and further, the Hospital denies any allegations of quality of care issues or wrongdoing,” the hospital said in a statement on Monday.

Serfer alleged that he began noticing issues at the facility in 2014, including staff negligence.

"Not interested in working, not interested in patient care, not interested in doing a good job," Serfer recently said.

He claimed he also saw harassment and claimed there was unnecessary care by both doctors and administrative leaders. Those concerns were reported.

"There were very abusive behaviors of the nurses, abusive and degrading behavior of the patients,” said Serfer. "Me and others started filing complaints to the administration and those complaints were ignored.”

Instead, Serfer said he faced retaliation.  He said while assisting the National Disaster Medical System Services in Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria he was replaced at the hospital by Dr. Jeremy Barnett.

“A complaint was filed with the NYS Department of Health last summer related to policies and procedures associated with management oversight of employees at Auburn Community Hospital. The Department of Health responded to the complaint and conducted a thorough inquiry in late August 2018,” the hospital said. “The Inspectors interviewed numerous nurses and doctors and staff of the hospital including doctors who are mentioned in the media reports. The Department of Health inspectors found certain deficiencies related to a lack of oversight and formal documentation when addressing personnel issues. However, there was no finding that the quality of care was compromised.”

The hospital said it developed a “Plan of Correction,” which was accepted by the state and “state Investigators came back on site at the hospital in November 2018 and concluded that no further action was required.”