Highly Recommended Pages…

Good morning, all - Happy Easter to those who celebrate it, and Happy Spring to everyone; The development of this blog site continues apace. There are many developments in the war on docs I am anxious to bring you up to date on, including:

— the re-trial of Dr. Billy Hurwitz, currently in progress;
— the status of Richard Paey’s bid for clemency from the new Florida governor (the outgoing Gov. Bush turned him down);
— the escalation of the govt’s full-court propaganda press Re: prescription drug abuse - this is important because the generation of a public ‘moral panic’ becomes the justification for treating all pain patients as (undeserving) ‘addicts’ until proven otherwise, and for the intensification of the persecution of pain doctors;
— stuff like this.

So, a lot of work to be done. But today, I want to draw your attention to the left column of this blog site. Under the heading "Highly Recommended" are several documents that are among the most requested documents, year after year, on doctordeluca.com. Check this box regularly - I will be adding other special resources, perhaps displaying them on a rotating basis. Take a moment to scan one or two of these Highly Recommended documents… good background reading for any serious student of the war on docs and the pain crisis, and they will give you a feel for the issues and problems we will be addressing here at the War on Doctors / Pain Crisis blog. Specifically:

A Critical Assessment of the Impact of Drug Testing Programs on the American Workplace is a good review of this important related drug war topic that is currently in the news (govt push to drug test high school students);
War on Drugs, War on Doctors, and the Pain Crisis in America — this is probably THE CORE document; if you only read one article on my sites, let it be this one. This paper is my best attempt to date at putting our current nightmare into historical, epidemiological, and ethical context;
War on Pain Sufferers Special Collections — These are intended to be timely and time-saving resources especially for journalists, researchers, and students of the War on Doctors and the Pain Crisis in America. Each Special Collection attempts to join the most informative or otherwise interesting journalistic and advocacy documents with selected academic or official reports and expert commentary from the listServs and forums of PRN to provide background and context. There are currently some 14 collections; this is THE PLACE to get up to speed on:
- the Dr. Hurwitz case,
- the trials of Dr. Fisher,
- the Pyrrhic victory of Dr. Heberle,
- selected Major Media in the WOD,
- the ’sex-for-drugs’ case of Dr. Rottschaefer,
- medical cannabis,
- the amazing vanishing DEA FAQ debacle,
- the Myrtle Beach Massacre,
- Dr. Knox and Beverly Boone, racketeers?,
- USA v Dr. McIver,
- and more.

I’m good for about two poems a decade. Here is my best effort from the past ten years; I am gratified to say that it has been extraordinarily popular ever since I first published it in 2001: The truth about OxyContin from a medical point of view. (And if you like that, you can also try the distinctly less popular: How to Understand Chronic Pain);
Finally, on the substance use disorders side a few gems: — Abstinence vs. Harm Reduction - a False Dichotomy is probably the best thing I’ve ever written, and, — The Controlled Drinking Debates - a Review of Four Decades of Acrimony, by Dr. Brook Hersey, is a simply phenomenal article - scholarly yet eminently readable - covering our fascinating, peculiarly American, relationships with alcohol.

OK, that’s it for now. Hope all is as well as might be expected with you all.

..alex…