Posts Tagged With: pain relief network

I am very glad to see physicians, who have themselves been savaged by the government, publishing their stories. Consider Dr. Jackson’s article, Conviction without a Crime, to be a companion piece to Dr. Rottschaefer’s article discussed in the previous item here, The Criminal Criminal Justice System. Together these two articles will give the reader a good sense, I think, of the utter breakdown of professional ethics, common sense, and fairness in any case involving controlled substances.

criticisms and description of federal prosecutorial behavior rings true to me from my experience and knowledge of war on docs/pain crisis cases. Our justice system is withering, ‘the drugs exception to the Bill of Rights’ has gone from being a tragic lawyers joke to business as usual, and we now routinely apply asset forfeiture and RICO laws, intended by Congress to combat drug cartels, to individual pain-treating physicians. Doctors and sick people are easy, profitable prey for law enforcement and federal prosecutors pandering to the electorate through a media willing to be exploited for their share of the spoils.

There are so many who need opioid pain medications and can not get them… These people have their lives destroyed every day as they drag themselves from doctor to doctor being lied to, verbally and sometimes physically abused, forced into unnecessary rounds of expensive testing… They are sneered at by pharmacists, called addicts by doctors, drug tested, called “frequent-flyers” and other derogatory names by emergency room nurses and doctors, denied reimbursement…

Unrelieved pain has a devastating impact on the physical, emotional, social, and economic well being of patients and their families. Diagnosing and treating pain is, therefore, fundamental to the public health. Terminology is review, myths identified, and medical understanding is stated.

Article from PascoTribune, including video interview of Paey, about Paey’s readjustment to live out of prison as a pardoned chronic pain patient. Permalink:

I spoke to Billy’s wife briefly, recently, and am very happy to be able to report that Dr. Hurwitz is no longer in federal prison. He is currently in a half-way house in D.C. and will be transitioning to house arrest as part of his parole and probation requirements… He is in a sort of “titration to house arrest” best I understand it. Meaning, he is starting to get overnight visits with his family - YEA! - and more and more of that till he sort of “stabilizes” on a regimen of maintenance house arrest. (Is house arrest a substitution therapy for …

Update on the case of USA v Dr. Martinez in Washington state. Martinez has been acquitted of all drug crime charges. The fraud charges remaining after her 2007 fed trial have also been dismissed, but the govt can bring the fraud charges anew. Also examined is a recent Yakima Herald article announcing “new” charges that are not, in any reality-based sense, “new” at all.

It seems to me an uncivilized and insane notion that just because someone in current moderate to severe pain had a history of an alcohol or drug problem, or even a current substance abuse problem, that you would deny them opioid therapy if that was the best medication to relieve their suffering. But this seems to be a point of confusion that increasingly comes up from patients, doctors, and regulators alike. So, in this post, let me make the medical standard of care in this situation perfectly clear. [...]

Excerpt: “As usual, the academics ignore the elephant in the living room. Regarding review articles that wring their hands about the lack of long term evidence of the safety and efficacy of opioid analgesic therapy, they never discuss the impossibility of measuring the efficacy and safety of a therapy that almost no physician is comfortable doing properly. For an excellent analysis of what we might call the “new academic opiophobia,” see the Pain Relief Network’s 2008 “WA State Tort Claim” pages 34 - 37.”

A federal judge on Thursday denied the government\’s efforts to gag defense attorneys, family and supporters of a Kansas doctor accused of unlawfully prescribing medication. In his ruling, U.S. District Judge Monti Belot said the government had not shown a compelling government interest in restraining speech.

*__Pain Relief Network files State Tort Claim vs. WA State__*; Laura Cooper, Esq.; [Pain Relief Network][prn]; 2008/07/08. [**Full text PDF**] **Permalink:** http://doctordeluca.com/wordpress/archive/prn-tort-claim-vs-wa/ **See also:** [**PRN Complaint for Declaratory and Injunctive Relief, and Damages**][d1] - 2008 and, [**WA's Interagency Guideline on Opioid Dosing for Non-Cancer Pain**][d2] - 2007 —- SUMMARY: Nature of Relief Sought: This lawsuit is the result of grossly misinformed prejudices about opioid(1) pain medications held by high-level Washington public health officials. Those prejudices are identified in medical literature …

Other People Get It - a War on Doctors/Pain Crisis YouTube Playlist. Seven drug war/pain crisis related videos, not directly Pain Relief Network related, that I like or think are otherwise worthwhile.

Blog post about a legal brief (full text link provided), a Memorandum and Order setting conditions for and releasing Dr. Stephen Schneider pending trial.

Every time I think this action by Siobhan Reynolds on behalf of the abandoned pain patients of Dr. Stephen Schneider can’t get any worse, on the human-suffering scale, the Fed. lashes out again, digging themselves in deeper, making themselves look dopey; not to mention the State, as Congressional Clowns pander and Medical Board members dither… The band played on. [...]

Blog post about an example of war on doctors Trash Journalism, which is analyzed. Excerpt: “So what is the message? Well one clear message to me is that the line between pain patient and ‘addict’ - that pitiable dregs of humanity; the walking dead; that criminal scourge; is thin and vague. In fact it is presented as the slippery slope if not an inevitability - people on chronic opioid therapy are, or will become, addicts. Pain patient, drug addict, who cares? Drug are bad, people who use them are bad, you and I are better than that; they deserve what …