Massachusetts Gone Rogue

You would not believe how your tax dollars are being spent by the Massachusetts Board of Registration in Medicine, an organization whose sole purpose is to protect the citizens of Massachusetts from rogue, incompetent medical practitioners. Especially during pandemics.

Once upon a time I came to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to study and later to practice medicine. But after a while I left Taxachusetts for Vacationland, also known as the Great State of Maine, as many have done before and after me. That was 27 years ago, and I never looked back–until today, that is.

My Massachusetts medical license expired 25 years ago, with nary a blemish on it. I practiced for another 25 years in Maine, also unblemished, until performing a forbidden act: treating patients who had Covid before their lips turned blue. Apparently, I had never learned modern medicine; I was stuck in the old paradigm that an ounce of prevention was worth a pound of cure. Why, oh why, did I listen to grandma?

I have to admit it. I also touched the third rail–how could I not have known better? I made the mistake of using the words “side effects” in the same sentence as “vaccines.” Everyone but me knew there was no association between them. Vaccines are a gift from God. It is sacrilegious to utter even a word against them. In fact, without vaccines humans would never have been able to breed like rabbits and populate every corner of the planet. Vaccines are…special. And as of today, in France, you can be sent to jail for speaking out against them. So, please, learn from my mistakes.

I didn’t attend the right continuing education courses. Spent too much time on those courses required by the Board of Registration in Medicine learning how to give out narcotics, because pain is the fifth vital sign, just in case you didn’t know that. No one should have to experience pain. The job of the doctor is to medicate away symptoms, and I am just too old, and I never could break the habit of trying to root out the causes of illness.

I committed another crime, actually a capital offense in medicine. I charged $60 for a 30-minute office visit. I couldn’t help myself. I had this crazy idea that everyone deserved medical care, and particularly that everyone needed to be saved from deadly viruses, even when they were poor. So I treated patients and asked them to mail a check afterwards. Apparently, I got the whole payment thing aft-backwards.

By the way, there has never been a patient complaint. Don’t tell me that became a crime too?

Well, eventually my crimes caught up with me, as these things do, and the good people on the Maine Board of Licensure in Medicine had their way with me. I can no longer practice medicine, even though the Maine Board still has not finalized an Order detailing all my crimes and penalties. Somehow a dog ate the Board staff’s homework, and so the Board asked to redo its litany of my crimes, but missed the statute of limitations (which is about 5 seconds long) to do so.

So, now we have to litigate over that, it seems. I am still waiting for the Board’s final decision on my case. But my lawyers filed an appeal nonetheless, and we are also suing the Board for a malicious prosecution. That makes three “matters” for the lawyers. See why nobody wants to go down this road?

But never mind, because the Massachusetts Board of Licensure galloped in to save their Maine brethren from ignominy. Wait, what?

The Massachusetts Board got wind of these goings-on, and decided to jump on Maine’s bandwagon. And so an investigator, Robert M. Bouton from the Massachusetts Medical Board informed me today that he will be recommending that the Massachusetts Board initiate disciplinary action against me.

Please bear in mind that I have not lived or practiced in Massachusetts for over 25 years. I have no medical license there. I have no property there. I wouldn’t know a Massachusetts patient if I tripped over one. What jurisdiction could they possibly have? Maine was once part of Massachusetts, but it became a separate state in 1819. Surely the Massachusetts Medical Board doesn’t think Maine is still their chattel?

According to Mr. Bouton, I have an “inchoate right” to ask to reactivate my medical license in Taxachusetts, not that I would want to, and this whisper, this zephyr of a right is what allows the Board and its Bouton to come after me.

Are they interested in extracting a monetary penalty? Is this some new cause of action, a potential medical asset forfeiture? Do they really have a zephyr of a right, or are they just blowing smoke?

It seems there are no coincidences. The universe has an impeccable sense of humor. The part-time ER doctor who was the Maine Board’s expert witness against me was named Dr. Faust. I wondered what the French word “bouton” meant, and the answer was very surprising. Hard to believe. But the Cambridge dictionary insists it is so. It means “zit” in French. If I had a name like that, I’d be a mean son of a gun too.

So, now my lawyers have a fourth “matter” to address. Mr. Bouton spins his wheels. And the citizens of Massachusetts are paying to be protected from a rogue ex-doctor in her seventies who might someday wish to come back to the Commonwealth to prey on them, especially if another pandemic happened and patients seeking care needed to be protected from themselves, since, you know, medicines can kill you!