Tenet was founded in 1967 by three lawyers: Richard Eamer, Leonard Cohen and John Bedrosian and originally named National Medical Enterprises (NME) and originally headquartered in Los Angeles, California. The company spent its first decade building and acquiring medical facilities and related services. The company began seven construction projects in 1971, tripling in size within a year. In the mid-1980s, NME shifted its focus to specialty hospitals. After some scandals in the early 1990s (see below), NME unloaded its specialty facilities, reconfiguring itself as Tenet Healthcare Corporation in 1995, and again turned its focus to acute care. Tenet dominated the southern California market, and sought a foothold in south Florida, Louisiana and Texas, as well as the Philadelphia area. Eventually, Tenet owned 111 hospitals. In 2002, however, the company became entangled in scandals, as one of its hospitals came under scrutiny for its surgical practices and another was investigated in a kickback scheme (see below).[4] In 2003, Trevor Fetter became CEO and started the Commitment to Quality that same year, an initiative that included improvements in data gathering and statistics.[5] The company also