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01/21/05 |
January 21, 2005 -- Dr. Frank Lucido's statement at the 1/21/05 special meeting of the MBC to discuss
the Enforcement Monitor's preliminary report on their 2 year investigation of
the MBC:
Frank H. Lucido
M.D.
Diplomate A.B.F.P.
2300 Durant Avenue
Berkeley, Ca,
94704
510-848-0958
fax 510-848-0961
[email protected]
January 21, 2005
Members of the Medical Board of
California,
I am Dr. Frank Lucido. My independent watchdog website is
called MedicalBoardWatch.com.
It is a pleasure to again be able to
address you, in this, my 8th appearance before the DMQ (Division of Medical
Quality) members, and the first before the full Board.
My
Background:
I graduated from the University of Michigan Medical School in
1974.
I am trained in Family Practice through UC Davis, but have also been an
emergency room physician, and medical director of skilled nursing facilities. I
have done medical-legal consulting on malpractice cases, reviewing records for
the plaintiff, and testifying in depositions, and trial depositions. I have been
on the Credentials Committee, the Ethics Committee, and the Family Practice
Advisory Committee of Alta Bates Hospital, and have been a preceptor for new
doctors to the medical staff, and have therefore reviewed other doctors' work,
in a variety of settings. I have been an active member of the medical staff of
Alta Bates Medical Center in Berkeley, in good standing, for 25 years. I
continue to practice Family and general Medicine in Berkeley for the past 25
years.
Since passage of the California Compassionate Use Act of 1996, I
have also studied and become one of local experts on the clinical use of
medicinal cannabis.
In
addition to the committees mentioned above, I have worked as a Steering
Committee member of the Bay Area Chapter of Physicians for Social Responsibility
for the past 14 years, and I know that busy committee members DO have to rely on
their staff, but first and foremost you need to have staff that you can rely
upon so you can direct them correctly.
Reading
the Enforcement Monitor’s Report has been helpful for me in understanding a bit
how the Board functions and malfunctions.
I
am impressed with the diversity and dedication of the many Board members I have
gotten to know.
I have been following the DMQ’s quarterly meetings
closely due to being one of 12 doctors who have been inappropriately
investigated for having recommended medical cannabis. This issue is given 3 full
pages (out of 294 pages ) in the Enforcement Monitor’s Report, (the only mention
in the 60 page Executive Summary is at bottom of page ES-13: “and a note on the
medical marijuana issue”, in describing Chapter VI “Complaint Receipt and
Screening: Central Complaint Unit” . (See Chapter VI, bottom of page 93 through
page 96.)
My many appearances before the Board and my many statements
to the DMQ, have all been related to the inappropriate investigations of many of
the most outspoken doctors on the issue of medical cannabis.
(see right-hand
column of www.MedicalBoardWatch.com for all of my statements and documents which
I have given the Board.
There you will also find http://www.medboardwatch.com/mbc-August-1-03.htm
for the documents I have given the DMQ showing that cannabis is safe and
effective medicine.)
I have not the read the entire 294 page Enforcement
Monitor’s Report, but from a close reading of the 3 pages on the Medical
Cannabis issue, with which I am intimately familiar, I already see the
Enforcement Monitor has been taking the word of the Board’s legal staff at face
value. I have documented on MedicalBoardWatch.com their many inaccuracies and
misstatements, and my subsequent refutation of them.
The
Problem:
I do not believe that the Board’s problems lie with insufficient
funds or staffing.
The major problem for the Medical Board in fulfilling
its mission “to protect healthcare consumers” is a serious misallocation of
priorities, and therefore a misallocation of funds and human resources. Another
problem is having staff that is, at best, ignorant of the law, or, at worst,
intentionally misrepresents it.
Facts:
At least 12 of the 20 most
outspoken doctors on the subject of medical cannabis have had costly
investigations begun on them. This is over 50% of those who speak up. In spite
of your legal staff’s denial, which the Enforcement Monitor seems to have taken
as face value, I still have reason to believe that essentially NONE of the
complaints have come from a patient or legal guardian. I believe that almost all
complaints have come from law enforcement, with its well-documented
institutional bias against medical cannabis.
(I checked again this morning,
and the California Narcotic Officer's Association website (http://www.cnoa.org/position-papers-1.htm
) still has the following untruth: "There is no justification for using
marijuana as a medicine." This lie is thoroughly contradicted by the federal
government's own 1999 Institute of Medicine report.
According to Ms.
Jerzak, the current Chief of Enforcement, the MBC receives 12,000 complaints per
year. You certainly don’t have the resources to investigate 50% of those, and
yet you have for medical cannabis, all for cases in which there was no harm, and
no patient complained.
The Enforcement Monitor criticizes the Board for
failing to pursue complaints aggressively. And yet it certainly seemed to have
found a wealth of time to pursue and investigate over 50% of the most outspoken
doctors on the issue of medical cannabis.
The Enforcement Monitor states
that the Board rarely goes to court to force doctors to turn over medical
records. And yet they illegally pursued Dr. David Bearman’s patient records,
without patient consenting to give up his Personal Health Information (PHI),
after a complaint from a park ranger that Dr. Bearman had recommended cannabis.
(See Bearman v. Joseph/Medical Board of California: http://www.medboardwatch.com/Bearman-v-Joseph.htm
for the rebuke your legal staff received for ignorance of the law from the
California Superior Court Judge.)
MBC Mission
“The mission of the
Medical Board of California is to protect healthcare consumers through the
proper licensing and regulation of physicians and surgeons and certain allied
healthcare professions and through the vigorous, objective enforcement of the
Medical Practice Act.”
Not only do these inappropriate investigations do
damage to good, compassionate doctors, but they damage innocent, ill patients
who have no complaints against their doctors for recommending a safe and
effective medicine.
It is NOT a service to California patients to
inappropriately investigate their doctors and attempt to obtain their Personal
Health Information illegally and without their consent.
All of my
previous statements to the MBC are posted on: MedicalBoardWatch.com or
MedBoardWatch.com .
As I said at the July 30th DMQ meeting, I am monitoring
all cases that come to my attention of doctors being investigated for having
recommended cannabis.
I will be posting all pertinent documents on
www.MedicalBoardWatch.com (also www.MedBoardWatch.com).
Thank you for
your attention.
Frank H. Lucido MD
[email protected]
www.MedicalBoardWatch.com |
