Entitlement, addiction, bad seed?
It is with great sadness that I read about anyone being sentenced to prison. Sometimes, the person being sent to prison – all too often actually – clearly committed crimes to pay for the drugs they needed to feed their addiction. Sometimes, the person is clearly, in my professional opinion, ,mentally ill. Sometimes the person, on the surface, is someone who has apparently felt entitled to make a lot of money even if doing so was at the direct or indirect expense of others. Perhaps entitled is not the correct term. Perhaps compelled is a more accurate term.
For example, one might wonder why someone would spend the time, energy and money to obtain a license to practice medicine in the United States to primarily focus on making money. Why not just skip all those years of medical training and join the mafia or some other gang? I suspect that one does not start out with the primary motivation of making money. Perhaps on gets so tired of dealing with all the frustrations of the current medical system in the United States or of dealing with those with chronic conditions such as addiction that he or she becomes jaded and despondent. Perhaps there are often other factors which we do not know about him or his life.
Just this week in this small community a physician was sentenced in Federal court for defrauding Medicaid and prescribing addictive medication for the sole purpose of making money. He had to pay a relatively modest fine and a minor amount in restitution. In addition, he has been sentenced to 57 months in prison; a relatively short time compared to the sentences of many others. I also suspect his license to practice medicine has been permanently revoked.
Nothing that I read about the sentencing indicated that the goal was for him to get counseling or other treatment. The goal seems to be to punish this doctor. Perhaps some in the system believe that sentencing this man to prison time and paying fines will deter others from committing similar crimes. Perhaps it will, although the history of punishing individuals and incarcerating them in this country has not deterred new crimes and a return to jail. I do not know if the recidivism rates for physicians are less than the overall average. Certainly, it has not seemed to have slowed down or stopped the practice of charging what the market will bear for medications, certain medical practices or other services; of finding legal ways to focus on making money instead of serving others.
I have no idea of how this doctor, after such extensive training, allowed himself to fall prey to changing his goal from serving others to making money. Perhaps this is not what happened. Perhaps there were other factors affecting his decisions. I do believe that all of us in the community would be better served by attempting to more accurately diagnose the problem and designing a treatment for that problem. The general diagnosis of bad seed or bad person is vague, inaccurate, and not conducive to effecting change in that person or in others who will fall prey to similar temptations.
Written September 19, 2018
It is with great sadness that I read about anyone being sentenced to prison. Sometimes, the person being sent to prison – all too often actually – clearly committed crimes to pay for the drugs they needed to feed their addiction. Sometimes, the person is clearly, in my professional opinion, ,mentally ill. Sometimes the person, on the surface, is someone who has apparently felt entitled to make a lot of money even if doing so was at the direct or indirect expense of others. Perhaps entitled is not the correct term. Perhaps compelled is a more accurate term.
For example, one might wonder why someone would spend the time, energy and money to obtain a license to practice medicine in the United States to primarily focus on making money. Why not just skip all those years of medical training and join the mafia or some other gang? I suspect that one does not start out with the primary motivation of making money. Perhaps on gets so tired of dealing with all the frustrations of the current medical system in the United States or of dealing with those with chronic conditions such as addiction that he or she becomes jaded and despondent. Perhaps there are often other factors which we do not know about him or his life.
Just this week in this small community a physician was sentenced in Federal court for defrauding Medicaid and prescribing addictive medication for the sole purpose of making money. He had to pay a relatively modest fine and a minor amount in restitution. In addition, he has been sentenced to 57 months in prison; a relatively short time compared to the sentences of many others. I also suspect his license to practice medicine has been permanently revoked.
Nothing that I read about the sentencing indicated that the goal was for him to get counseling or other treatment. The goal seems to be to punish this doctor. Perhaps some in the system believe that sentencing this man to prison time and paying fines will deter others from committing similar crimes. Perhaps it will, although the history of punishing individuals and incarcerating them in this country has not deterred new crimes and a return to jail. I do not know if the recidivism rates for physicians are less than the overall average. Certainly, it has not seemed to have slowed down or stopped the practice of charging what the market will bear for medications, certain medical practices or other services; of finding legal ways to focus on making money instead of serving others.
I have no idea of how this doctor, after such extensive training, allowed himself to fall prey to changing his goal from serving others to making money. Perhaps this is not what happened. Perhaps there were other factors affecting his decisions. I do believe that all of us in the community would be better served by attempting to more accurately diagnose the problem and designing a treatment for that problem. The general diagnosis of bad seed or bad person is vague, inaccurate, and not conducive to effecting change in that person or in others who will fall prey to similar temptations.
Written September 19, 2018
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