Are Pill Mill Doctors Managing Pain to Death?

Suspected 'pill mill' doctor Kevin Buckwalter, has been defending himself against lawsuits in Clark County District Court filed by families of five patients who died.

Courtesy: Las Vegas Sun and setyoufreenews.com

(LAS VEGAS, Nv.) - Recently a verdict in the Casey Anthony trial stunned the nation when the 25 year old mother accused of killing her 2 year old baby girl, Caylee was found not guilty by a jury. Did the jury truly feel that the mother was not responsible for her daughter's death -- or was it the result of a new strategy being utilized by the legal profession -- divert from the accused and focus on the family of the victim? Casey Anthony's attorney, Jose Baez, came into the ring, I mean courtroom, prepared for a fight and threw the first punch -- how could Casey Anthony go for a month without reporting her daughter missing? "The answer is actually relatively simple. She never was missing," Baez said. "Caylee Anthony died on June 16, 2008 when she drowned in her family's swimming pool."

Baez also claimed that Casey Anthony's father, George Anthony, found the body in the backyard pool and indicated that he helped dispose of the body. The defense lawyer even suggested George Anthony planted evidence to implicate his daughter and deflect suspicion from himself.

"What makes this case unique is the family that it happened to. You will hear stories about a family that is incredibly dysfunctional, you will hear about ugly things, secret things, things that people don't speak about," Baez said. Casey Anthony wept as defense attorney Baez described her and her family. Anthony's defense team alleged that she was sexually abused by her father and brother and hid her daughter's death like she hid the secret of her alleged sexual abuse.

George Anthony became the accused -- not Casey Anthony -- and Casey walked free. Good legal strategy, or a horrific miscarriage of justice?

In Nevada there is a legal case involving a physician who has been accused of running a pill mill which has resulted in the death of patients and the filing of lawsuits against the family practice doctor named Kevin Buckwalter.  Buckwalter went to medical school at Ross University in the West Indies and was licensed to practice in Nevada in 1997. The Las Vegas Sun reported that Buckwalter, a pediatrician and family doctor, had prescribed one of his patients more than 17,000 narcotic painkillers in 3-1/2 years, even after the man had overdosed on the pills.

Only Dr. Buckwalter's legal defense is playing a different card in their hand -- they have filed a lawsuit against the parents of a young woman named Andrea Duncan, who died from an overdose of narcotics that Buckwalter allegedly prescribed.

Andrea Duncan began treatment with Buckwalter in November 2004 with complaints of back and head injuries as a result of a motor vehicle acident approximately four years prior. In nine months of treating Duncan, she was prescribed 2,130 tablets of OxyContin, in addition to 1,200 hydrocodone pills (Vicodin and Lortab) -- as well as 3,500 Xanax pills. Duncan, died in 2005 from intoxication with opiates and benzodiazepines, a class of drugs that includes Valium and Xanax. Four days earlier, her husband Clint, also a Buckwalter patient, had overdosed on prescription narcotics and died.

Buckwalter's attorney is his brother, Bryce, and in a lawsuit filed accuses John and Maggie DeBaun of abusing the legal process, intentionally inflicting emotional distress and interfering with his ability to do business by filing a medical malpractice case against him for the death of their daughter, Andrea Duncan. The lawsuit against the DeBaun's states "In reality, Defendent's lawsuit (DeBaun) against Plaintiff (Buckwalter) was brought for the purpose of harassing and annoying Plaintiff and to further damage the reputation of Plaintiff in any way possible." Plaintiff has been forced to retain an attorney and is entitled to recover all of his reasonable attorney's fees." "I've never heard of such a lawsuit," said Stacey Tovino, a professor at the William S. Boyd School of Law at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Tovino and other Nevada legal experts said it appears to them that Buckwalter abused the legal process in an attempt to intimidate the DeBauns.

Ann McGinley, a University of Nevada at Las Vegas (UNLV) law professor, said "It takes more than simply filing a lawsuit to support a claim of intentional infliction of emotional distress. And given that Buckwalter lost his ability to prescribe controlled substances in 2008, it’s difficult to see how the DeBauns interfered with Buckwalter’s ability to conduct his business." McGinley said that "if lawsuits like Buckwalter’s became more common, they could have a chilling effect, discouraging patients from pursuing legitimate malpractice claims. My concern is that other doctors will take this on as something that they will do regularly.”

A 2008 Las Vegas Sun investigation highlighted the opinions of four pain-management specialists who reviewed Buckwalter’s care of patients and said it appeared to be negligent.

Staci Voyda, a teenager addicted to prescription narcotics, wrote in her journal that she went to Buckwalter to get off drugs. But his treatment allegedly included ramping up her dosages of narcotics. She killed herself in August 2007, and family members say the drugs pushed her over the edge. Another Buckwalter patient, 69-year-old Barbara Baile, was allegedly prescribed large doses of narcotics, which caused constipation so severe it ruptured her bowels. A subsequent infection killed her. In a 2007 videotaped deposition for an unrelated lawsuit, Buckwalter described the treatment he provided Duncan. Under oath, Buckwalter said he did not examine Duncan on her first visit because he “did not have time,” yet prescribed her 300 tablets of Xanax, an anti-anxiety medication, and the painkiller hydrocodone, a synthetic opiate. The following year, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and Nevada State Board of Medical Examiners took away Buckwalter's license to prescribe controlled substances. The DEA investigated and allegedly attributed at least eight overdose deaths to Buckwalter. The medical board accused him of four cases of malpractice, including one in which the patient died. As a result of the charges, Buckwalter closed his practice. The Board of Medical Examiners recently agreed to lift the 2008 suspension of Buckwalter’s ability to prescribe, administer and dispense controlled substances.

Buckwalter's legal team -- or dream team if they pull this defense strategy off -- is the doctor had record-keeping problems and there is no evidence that Buckwalter harmed anyone. While lifting the suspension was described as a procedural move, officials said it was warranted for other reasons favorable to Buckwalter.

"The committee (an investigative panel) feels that the lack of imminent threat to the public that now exists is pretty obvious. A long time has passed since the suspension date of Dr. Buckwalter’s prescribing abilities and privileges from November 2008 to today," Bradley Van Ry, deputy general counsel for the board, told the board. "The public has been sufficiently protected over that interim," he said. That's reassuring that the public has been "protected" for three years -- but where is the protection going forward? The upcoming hearing on the four malpractice complaints filed in 2008 "will sufficiently protect the public should a violation or multiple violations be found by Dr. Buckwalter," Van Ry said. On top of that, board member Dr. Javaid Anwar noted Buckwalter has been taking continuing medical education courses. "We all hope that we learn from the issues that we face in our life," Anwar added.

Despite the lifting of the suspension, Buckwalter may not be prescribing drugs anytime soon since the federal Drug Enforcement Administration also stripped Buckwalter of his prescribing authority in 2008, alleging that at least eight of his patients since 2005 had died of overdoses.

The DEA seems to have taken on the "pit bull stance" while the Board of Medical Examiners has taken the "dachshund or wienie dog" stance.

Buckwalter, in the meantime, has been defending himself against lawsuits in Clark County District Court filed by families of five patients who died:

• Andrea Duncan
• Barbara Baile
• Staci Voyda
• Stephen Richard Holden
• Christopher Fisher

In a motion filed by Buckwalter's "dream team" they stated -- "Buckwalter was a family and primary care physician who, due to an overly aggressive regulatory environment, was one of the few physicians in Nevada willing to treat patients with chronic and severe pain.  However, with the summary suspension of Dr. Buckwalter's license, he immediately became a leper to the medical community.  He was crucified in the press and blacklisted from all payor panels."

Buckwalter shouldn't have to be concerned with being "crucified" in the press, as long as Judge P. Pilate doesn't hear Buckwalter's cases.  Who knows Buckwalter's dream team may just pull off a Casey Anthony legal strategy -- which kind of lends itself to those sick shark infested water jokes about attorneys, doesn't it?

Could be worse, Buckwalter could be charged at a minimum with wrongful death, manslaughter or murder if a U.S. Attorney brought charges against him.

LP - "Love is the master key that opens the gates of happiness." Oliver Wendall Homes

In July 2007, she testified against Purdue Pharma in Federal Court in Virginia at the sentencing of their three CEO's - Michael Friedman, Howard Udell and Paul Goldenheim - who pleaded guilty to charges of marketing OxyContin as less likely to be addictive or abused to physicians and patients. That same month she also testified against Purdue Pharma at a Judiciary Hearing of the U.S. Senate.

In working with the Department of Justice and Attorney Generals, Marianne has been instrumental in charges being lodged against Purdue Pharma. She also has been retained as a consultant with private attorneys working on behalf of victims and their families against Purdue Phama.

Marianne is a leading authority on the marketing tactics used by Purdue Pharma through their funded pain societies such as the American Pain Foundation in pushing OxyContin for the "under-treatment of pain" in the United States and Canada. The under-treatment of pain is a marketing fallacy contrived by Purdue Pharma and allowed by the FDA. She continues to hold the FDA accountable for this epidemic of OxyContin and lobbies them to reclassify this narcotic to be prescribed for severe pain only - never moderate pain. To date, the FDA has turned a blind eye to the epidemic of death, addiction and abuse of this powerful narcotic. Marianne is a nurse having graduated in 1991 as president of her graduating class. She also has a Paralegal certification. She served on a Community Service Board for the Courier News, a Gannet newspaper in NJ writing articles predominantly regarding AIDS patients and their emotional issues. She was awarded a Community Service Award by the Hunterdon County, NJ HIV/AIDS Task Force in recognition of and appreciation for the donated time, energy and love in facilitating a Support Group for persons with HIV/AIDS.

http://www.purduepharma.com/pressroom/app/news_announc/USGovt_reponse_Main.pdf

judiciary.senate.gov/hearings/testimony.cfm?id=2905&wit_id=6612

i.bnet.com/blogs/sebelius-response.pdf

www.vawd.uscourts.gov/PurdueFrederickCo/default.asp

www.oxydeaths.com