[Schneider] Patients Ask State for Injunction

Patients Ask State Court for Injunction; Roxana Hegeman; Associated Press, Wichita Eagle; 2008-01-17. Source. Discuss this article!

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Patients of a Haysville physician who is charged with illegally prescribing pain medication asked a Sedgwick County court for an injunction prohibiting a state board from revoking the doctor’s medical license.

In court documents made public Thursday, the Pain Relief Network, on behalf of the patients of Dr. Stephen Schneider, filed for a temporary restraining order to keep the Kansas Board of Healing Arts from revoking his license without due process.

A hearing on the injunction was scheduled for 9 a.m. on Jan. 25 at the Sedgwick County Courthouse.

It seeks a restraining order to block the board - which sought an emergency suspension of his license after Schneider was indicted - from revoking Schneider’s license until he can personally appear to contest any such action.

“We believe that having a license in the state of Kansas is extremely important and before anybody loses their license they should be afforded all due process,” said Lawrence Williamson Jr., a Wichita attorney representing the Pain Relief Network.

In their filing, patients also claim that conduct of the U.S. Department of Justice and Assistant U.S. Attorney Tanya Treadway has placed patient lives in immediate jeopardy.

Jim Cross, spokesman for U.S. Attorney Eric Melgren, declined to comment on the filing.

The complaint by the Pain Relief Network was filed just before the Board of Healing Arts held a hearing to discuss a temporary suspension of the license. The complaint was instrumental in the state hearing officer’s decision to wait a month before ruling on the board’s request, said Siobhan Reynolds, president of the Pain Relief Network.

Attorneys agreed before the board hearing in Topeka that Schneider’s license would not be suspended until the case filed by the Pain Relief Network can be adjudicated, Reynolds said. That represents the first time the group has been able to “throw a monkey wrench” into the government’s attempts to close the Haysville clinic, she said.

The Pain Relief Network contends the government’s prosecution of Schneider is part of a crackdown across the nation of physicians who prescribe opioids for chronic pain management. A study published in Clinical Pharmacology & Therapeutics last year found 47 such prosecutions involving 53 doctors - 21 in state courts and 26 in federal courts.

The National Association of Attorneys General, alarmed by the enforcement actions, sent a letter to the Drug Enforcement Administration in 2005 saying they were exerting “a chilling effect” on the willingness of physicians to treat pain patients.

It was signed by the attorneys general of 29 states, including former Kansas Attorney General Phill Kline.

Connie White, a physician assistant at the Haysville clinic, said the clinic remains open although she is the only person seeing patients. She took issue with statements made at the Board of Healing Arts hearing in Topeka that she had been disciplined in the past.

“I felt it was another cheap shot at the clinic,” White said.

White said the incident for which she was disciplined was a minor documentation problem involving some additional notes she had put on a patient chart to clarify her previous notes. She was disciplined because the two charts did not match, and was ordered to take a 25-hour course on narcotic prescriptions, she said.

“I learned our procedure in the office is exactly what is mandated for chronic pain management,” White said.

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