Painfully Clear

Paul Krassner has a column up at the New York Press with a disturbing case study of a doctor who was convicted of "the heinous crime of prescribing Tylenol codeine for the treatment of migraine syndrome in a couple of ladies." The "ladies" turned out to be undercover agents for the Medical Board of California who basically set this poor guy up for the bust.

"This story is not unique," [Dr. L] writes. "It is being repeated across the United States every day. Our country seems to be slipping into a fascist regime with dictatorial, uncontrolled, coercive state power."

Over a period of several days, the two women, who were wired, "visited Dr. L’s office, complaining of symptoms that were consistent with migraine headaches." After listening to their history, he gave each of them 30 Tylenol codeine tablets until he could obtain their previous records.

This was a medically appropriate and humane response to the women's complaints. Unfortunately, the DEA thought otherwise.

Some weeks later, agents with drawn guns served a search warrant. They were from the DEA, BNA (a state agency comparable to the DEA) and the local police. ...The raid had a terrible effect on the economic health of Dr. L’s family practice, a standard mix of obstetrics, pediatrics and internal medicine. A story was planted in the local media–via press releases from those government agencies–stating that he was a drug-dealing doctor and would lose his license. He was shunned by colleagues.

"Several weeks later," he writes, "I was arrested at my office while many startled patients watched in utter disbelief as their doctor was handcuffed and led away. The arresting officers would not let me take off my clinic coat or stethoscope–this picture was worth more with them on. I was booked and subsequently released on bail."

The case took six years to come to trial. He was ultimately found guilty. He was sentenced to six months in jail, fined more than $11,000 and required to perform 200 hours of community service. He lost everything and is now in hock for legal fees in excess of $300,000. His family suffered along with him and his patients lost a good and obviously caring doctor.

Former San Francisco district attorney Patrick Hallinan "says that honest doctors all over the country are being targeted by the DEA. "There isn’t any doubt," he added, "that these prosecutions are increasing under the Bush administration. It is like busting a car dealer because somebody runs off the road and kills somebody."

Ironically in the interim, another doctor lost a malpractice case for under-prescribing medication.

Conversely, a California jury recently awarded $1.5 million to the family of an 85-year-old man whose doctor failed to treat him adequately for pain for a few days as he lay dying of lung cancer. That verdict was only the third in American history for the undertreatment of pain, and the first against a doctor. It was also the first time a jury awarded such a verdict under elder abuse laws instead of a medical negligence lawsuit.

We've been talking about this war on doctors for a many months here and our opinion has not changed. Doctors are mandated to treat pain and the DEA should stop meddling in medical protocols.

If there was any real justice in this country, the DEA agents would be on trial for "shooting ducks in a barrel" instead of going out in the world and doing their real job, which should be arresting so-called king pin dealers. Leave the doctors to be policed by their own licensing agencies who are more than equipped to make the judgments as to whether their members are practicing appropriately.