The Kaua‘i doctor charged with distributing a controlled substance outside of professional medical practice is negotiating with the Alabama U.S. Attorney’s Office but hasn’t pleaded guilty, he said yesterday.

Claiming he is a well-intentioned physician being mischaracterized by the government, Dr. Harold Spear III, of Hanapepe, admitted he consulted with patients suffering from pain across state lines over the phone but said he “believes history and time and understanding is a good 80 percent of medicine,” noting over-the-phone medicating is “almost as effective as a face-to-face visit.”

U.S. Alabama Attorney Alice Martin said in a prepared statement that from January 2004 to December 2005, Spear was writing Hydrocodone prescriptions for customers he never met.

“The pharmacists knew this, solicited the business, and put their profits above patient safety,” she said. Though narcotics prescription laws vary according to state, in Alabama, physicians are not permitted to prescribe narcotics based solely on answers to questions without having met the patient in person.

Martin announced last week her plans to garner guilty pleas from Spear and other doctors and pharmacists stemming from their relationship to an “illegal Internet pharmacy.”

Read more …

(Source: Amanda C. Gregg, Kauai Garden Island News)