Marshall Allen

Story Archive

For extra bucks, some get perks: Pregnant women who can pay can opt for concierge-style of care; Monday, Jan. 5, 2009; When most expectant mothers visit their obstetricians, they don stiff paper gowns. Platinum Mommies enjoy plush cloth gowns. Other pregnant women may have lengthy waits in their doctors’ offices and have a hard time reaching physicians after hours with questions. There’s another difference, too: Platinum Mommies pay $3,500 for their VIP treatment.
Clinic reports lapses in disinfection: Patients are at minimal risk, health officials say; Wednesday, Dec. 31, 2008; An outpatient surgery center has notified state authorities that it failed to properly disinfect instruments it uses during procedures, state health officials said Tuesday.
Brain institute thinking big: It wants to develop a model for treatment of dementia; Wednesday, Dec. 24, 2008; The country’s top dementia experts — academics, advocates and researchers — gathered in a conference room the other day to brainstorm public policy recommendations for Congress on how to fight dementia.
State fines providers, says more to come: Health Division official hopes hefty penalties will ensure rules are followed; Monday, Dec. 22, 2008; Saying that the hepatitis outbreak at the beginning of the year taught them a painful lesson, officials are hitting Nevada health care providers with much larger fines for breaking rules intended to protect the public.
Doctor linked to 8 overdose fatalities: DEA suspends Buckwalter’s right to prescribe narcotics nationally; Friday, Dec. 19, 2008; The Drug Enforcement Administration on Thursday stripped Dr. Kevin Buckwalter of his ability to prescribe controlled substances, alleging that at least eight of his patients since 2005 have died of overdoses. The DEA said that allowing the Henderson physician to prescribe controlled substances “constitutes an imminent danger to public health and safety.”
No money, no treatment: State says it can’t pay for the therapy hundreds of Nevada children need; Monday, Dec. 15, 2008; A Las Vegas woman is joining the Army, calling it the best way to get health care for her disabled infant — treatment the state is supposed to provide, but isn’t.
Remedy for a closed process: Medical board chief pitches plan to give patients a voice in discipline cases; Saturday, Dec. 6, 2008; When Louis Ling took administrative charge of the state’s medical board in September, he fretted that the process of investigating doctors and disciplining the bad ones could take two years or longer. Ling, who is a lawyer, was bothered too that the disciplinary process seemed more concerned about watching out for the doctors than the patients. The process was “cloaked in confidentiality,” as he put it, and “a lack of transparency inevitably leads to accusations of favoritism and unaccountability.”
Another doctor loses his right to prescribe: Psychiatrist, 81, can no longer provide patients access to controlled substances; Wednesday, Dec. 3, 2008; The Nevada State Medical Examiners Board has stripped a Las Vegas psychiatrist of his license to prescribe controlled substances because the drugs he prescribed to a Kentucky woman may have contributed to her suicide.
Medicaid cuts compound health, economic crises: But some see opportunity for universal coverage if things get bad enough; Tuesday, Dec. 2, 2008; There wasn’t broad consensus for decreasing gas consumption until we started paying $4 a gallon. Could there be a parallel with a call for universal health care?
Local doctors settle in Medicare case: One, prominent in the medical community, denies wrongdoing; Friday, Nov. 28, 2008; The former president of the Nevada State Medical Association, the state’s largest physician advocacy group, is one of six Las Vegas doctors who have repaid a total of $625,000 to the federal government to resolve allegations of Medicare fraud stemming from an apparent kickback scheme. Dr. Robert Shreck, who is now the medical director of HealthCare Partners, a large medical group in Las Vegas, was required to pay back $94,574 to the government, according to the agreement.
Medicare: Fixes to UMC’s transplant program appear sufficient: Wednesday, Nov. 26, 2008; Medicare officials said today that University Medical Center has turned around its troubled kidney transplant program — the only one in the state — meaning there is no immediate risk that the program will be closed. It’s the best possible news for the county’s public hospital and the approximately 200 patients on the waiting list to receive kidneys.
Nursing professor: Vegas' bad health ranking can be fixed: She calls it a matter of "political will" and reinvention; Wednesday, Nov. 26, 2008; Nancy Menzel refuses to accept as final Las Vegas’ ranking as one of the nation’s least healthy cities. The professor of nursing at UNLV and president of the Nevada Public Health Association explains.
License to prescribe lost, practice sold: State officials want to know where Buckwalter is, but say his lawyer isn’t telling; Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2008; A Henderson physician whose license to prescribe controlled substances was yanked by state authorities has abruptly sold his business, leaving his 1,500 patients in the hands of a new medical group.
Providers close doors to poor: Medicaid cuts leave no choice, says doctors, hospitals; Sunday, Nov. 16, 2008; Budget cuts in the state’s Medicaid program are forcing a major shift in where Nevada’s poor can seek health care. Cancer patients who had received outpatient treatment at University Medical Center, for instance, will have to seek treatment at other hospitals and clinics ...
Doctor loses license to prescribe: Officials find malpractice, including case in which narcotics had hand in death; Friday, Nov. 14, 2008; Saying they were frustrated by how long their investigation took, medical board officials on Thursday stripped Dr. Kevin Buckwalter of his license to prescribe controlled substances after a review of his records found four cases of malpractice, including one where “excessive” doses of narcotics contributed to a patient’s death.
Board strips doctor of license to prescribe controlled substances: Buckwalter was served with the decision after an emergency meeting; Thursday, Nov. 13, 2008; Nevada health authorities this morning stripped Dr. Kevin Buckwalter of his license to prescribe controlled substances, alleging four cases of malpractice, including one patient death due to excessive prescribing of narcotics.
Just being in Vegas raises risk of suicide, study finds: Thursday, Nov. 13, 2008; The risk of suicide is significantly increased by visiting or living in Las Vegas, and leaving town reduces the risk that a person will take his own life, a former UNLV researcher has found.
State: Please probe our J-1 system: Complaints of abuse in foreign doctor program filed with feds, state board; Friday, Nov. 7, 2008; State health officials announced Thursday that they have filed official complaints with federal and state agencies alleging that employers exploited foreign doctors and the laws that allow them to work in Nevada.
Physicians inform state of mistreatment in survey: Feedback will test state’s commitment to reform; Thursday, Nov. 6, 2008; Five foreign doctors working in Nevada have complained to state health officials that their employers have breached contracts, threatened them with deportation and asked them to perform duties that could have put them at risk of committing fraud and violating federal laws.
The myth of addicts’ power over actions: Chemical dependency is a disease, medical experts say, and should be treated as such; Thursday, Nov. 6, 2008; We don’t consider it a moral failure if a diabetic can’t control her blood sugar level.
Focus shifts to fixing kidney program’s faults: Inspectors found many shortfalls at UMC; Tuesday, Nov. 4, 2008; The intense appeals to save University Medical Center’s kidney transplant program from losing its Medicare funding have overshadowed fundamental patient safety problems revealed by inspectors.
Legally, doctor is under no limits: License still in force, Buckwalter can see patients, give access to narcotics; Tuesday, Oct. 21, 2008; Investigations of Dr. Kevin Buckwalter are continuing, but the Nevada State Medical Examiners Board has not suspended his license or taken any steps to force him to curtail his prescribing of large quantities of narcotic painkillers.
Her outlook darkened as her addiction deepened, journal details: Wednesday, Oct. 15, 2008; Staci Voyda’s journal is a stark look into prescription narcotic addiction.
When drugs bring harm not healing: Wednesday, Oct. 15, 2008; Two days before their first wedding anniversary, Andrea Duncan woke up to find her husband, Clint, beside her, dead of a prescription drug overdose. Instead of celebrating their marriage, she was planning her husband’s funeral.
Patient's husband remembers her wry humor, last pain-filled weeks: Wednesday, Oct. 15, 2008; Barbara Baile’s death was both agonizing and avoidable, leaving her husband of 50 years painfully lonely.
Volunteers forge ahead with plan to treat uninsured: Group has solid funding start, backing of local hospitals, and hundreds of professionals committed to its cause; Tuesday, Oct. 7, 2008; On Monday, Dr. Florence Jameson had proclaimed a miracle: About $600,000 in donations and pledges had been made to Volunteers in Medicine of Southern Nevada to help extend health care to those who can’t afford it.
Hospital must improve infection control: State inspectors say MountainView could be dropped by Medicare; Wednesday, Oct. 1, 2008; With the largest hepatitis C outbreak in the country still fresh in Southern Nevada’s consciousness, hospitals should be taking exceptional precautions to protect patients from infections.
One Las Vegas hospital has been slapped for failing to do so. The risk of contracting infections at MountainView Hospital has been so great that it is in jeopardy of being dropped …
Investigation’s over, but still no answers: Woman who says mental hospital confined her involuntarily never heard from state agency that looked into her allegations; Friday, Sept. 26, 2008; Michelle McCutchen deserves an answer.
Admitting crisis, leaders stress need for education, action on ethics: Sunday, Sept. 21, 2008; If Nevada’s ailing health care system is to be healed, it must start with a healthy dose of ethics.
One reason behind Nevada's problem with narcotic painkillers: Tuesday, Sept. 16, 2008; A Las Vegas man says his Henderson physician turned him into a drug addict and caused him to overdose by prescribing him as many as 1,170 narcotic painkillers in a single month.
He shares the ‘Amazing Grace’ that saved him: Past a life of addiction, past a beloved wife’s death, musician offers song and solace; Sunday, Sept. 14, 2008; When Dean Burke’s wife of 48 years lost her ability to communicate and lay dying in a hospital bed, he did the only thing he could to lift their spirits: He serenaded her with his accordion.
Physician under fire gets 2nd chance: Clinic owner can hire another doctor, but state stiffens contract; Wednesday, Sept. 10, 2008; A State Health Division committee created to correct abuses in a program that brings foreign doctors to medically needy communities on Tuesday effectively endorsed the employer who critics allege is one of its offenders.
Narcotics case a first for Nevada: Judge rejects pharmacy liability, allows lawsuit in deadly crash to proceed against two doctors; Wednesday, Sept. 3, 2008; Nevada bartenders are not liable for customers who drive drunk, but should the same be true for pharmacists who provide pills to suspected drug addicts?
Foreign physicians back boss — to a point: Asked to state that their employer followed rules, only half swear to it; Saturday, Aug. 30, 2008; Dr. Rachakonda Prabhu, one of Nevada’s most politically connected physicians, is struggling to clear his name in the alleged abuse of a government program to employ foreign physicians in medically needy areas.
For pharmacy techs, drugs easy to steal: Low-paid workers have easy access to pills and little cause to fear prosecution; Monday, Aug. 25, 2008; Some of the main suppliers to drug dealers wear white lab coats.
Patient’s paperwork came first: Witnesses say they were shocked; hospital’s experts say staff did what they could; Sunday, Aug. 24, 2008; Morton Scheinbaum was moaning, his head resting on a desk, as he strained to answer the emergency room nurse’s questions.
Moving board out in open, past storm: That’s what new head of state’s medical licensing panel says he’ll set out to do; Saturday, Aug. 23, 2008; Louis Ling is about to sit on the hot seat as the new executive director of the Nevada State Medical Examiners Board.
How we come to accept wrong as the new right: ‘Normalized deviance’ can lead to tragedy; Thursday, Aug. 14, 2008; Health care in Nevada seems to suffer from a normalization of deviance. In two recent high-profile cases — the hepatitis C crisis and the abuse of foreign doctors — professionals apparently ignored evidence of wrongdoing.
State confronts J-1 complaints: Billing probe launched; Vegas doctor told to rewrite contract for specialist he wants to hire; Friday, Aug. 8, 2008; In a series of unprecedented actions, state officials and a committee that oversees the hiring of foreign doctors have introduced new levels of accountability to a beleaguered program that allows foreign doctors to work in medically needy communities.
Doctor’s J-1 actions go under microscope: Physician accused in abuse of program applies to hire another foreign doctor; Thursday, Aug. 7, 2008; A state advisory committee today will examine the practices of a politically connected Las Vegas doctor who has been accused of exploiting foreign physicians — and now wants to hire another one.
Despite abuse reports, state sent accused employers more J-1 docs: After complaints they broke the law, partners approved for 5 more foreign physicians; Wednesday, Aug. 6, 2008; State officials not only ignored complaints that Las Vegas employers were abusing a government program involving foreign physicians, but allowed them to further exploit it, according to documents obtained by the Sun.
State knew of abuses, did almost nothing: Report rebuts assertions officials were in the dark about exploitation; Monday, Aug. 4, 2008; State officials have said for more than a year that they were unaware of complaints from foreign physicians that their bosses — most of them prominent immigrant doctors in Las Vegas — were getting rich by exploiting a program designed to help communities lacking medical providers.
Strapped Salvation Army ends free drug addict treatment: Thursday, July 31, 2008; The local Salvation Army, citing a $2 million budget deficit, says it will no longer accept unpaid referrals for its substance abuse program from the criminal justice system.
Overhaul of licensing agencies urged: Medical association: Umbrella group needed for fairness; Tuesday, July 29, 2008; Triggered by perceived failures on the part of the Medical Examiners Board during the hepatitis C investigation, Nevada’s largest physician association is proposing an overhaul of every licensing agency in the state to improve accountability and restore public trust.
Lack of resources blocks treatment: Stretched substance abuse programs struggle to cope with Nevada’s growing number of prescription narcotic addicts; Monday, July 28, 2008; She’s a mother of three, a hairdresser and on the brink of divorce, and this is how addicted she is to prescription narcotics: She gets so stressed just at the thought of quitting the drugs, she sweats and trembles, making her customers uncomfortable. So she pops Xanax to relax.
UnitedHealthcare releases payment schedule for vaccine: Tuesday, July 22, 2008; Officials from UnitedHealthcare, the company that recently took over Sierra Health Services, have reported the rates they pay doctors for the chickenpox vaccine.
Start of school just got pricier: Have a kindergartner and health insurance? A state cutback has added an item to your shopping list when the school year rolls around.; Friday, July 18, 2008; Parents of incoming kindergarten students may have to pay for chickenpox vaccines that were previously offered for free, because Nevada has stopped picking up the tab for children who are covered by health insurance.
Trying to script a solution: Pervasive use of narcotic painkillers has expert panel debating how and why; Sunday, July 13, 2008; Sunday Conversation: Experts blame Nevada’s skyrocketing rate of prescription narcotic use on hurried doctors who don’t adequately examine the patient’s history and source of pain, leading to inadequate treatment and the risk of addiction.
Officials urge action on painkiller abuse: Lawmaker calls rising death toll from prescription drugs ‘shocking’; Tuesday, July 8, 2008; State legislators and regulators Monday called the Sun’s reports about the startling rise in the use of narcotic painkillers in Nevada a wake-up call to improve patient care in the state.
Police say armed OxyContin addict terrorized Henderson household: Monday, July 7, 2008; Illicit drug use has long been linked to crime. But with the surge in drug addiction linked to prescribed narcotics, there’s a new wrinkle in that crime.