| Graphic: Rose Law Group |
Can a clinic refuse medical care to you, simply because you are a legal medical marijuana patient?
Several medical marijuana patients have reported being told they were unwelcome at clinics operated by Mark Twain St. Joseph’s Hospital in San Andreas, California.
More allegations came to light after hospital officials in early July claimed they had no policy stopping medical marijuana patients from receiving care, reports Dana M. Nichols at the Stockton Record.
The first patient to go public with the allegations was disabled veteran Sam Slayter. He said Dr. Rafael Rosado told him that he wouldn’t receive care at at Mark Twain clinic in Valley Springs unless he signed an agreement promising to stop using medical marijuana.
| Photo: ThePineTree.net |
| Dr. Rafael Rosado has reportedly been forcing patients to either sign a form agreeing to stop using medical marijuana and take drug tests — or receive no more medical care. |
At the time, Feliciano Jiron, president of the hospital, and Dr. Sean Anderson, vice president of medical affairs, doing the frantic spin thing, claimed that Slayter “may have misunderstood” Dr. Rosado.
But since then, other patients have come forward to corroborate Slayter’s account. They said they, too, were asked to sign forms promising not to use medical marijuana and were told — not just by Dr. Rosado but also by front-office staff — that Mark Twain doctors were no longer allowed to write medical marijuana recommendations.
David Jack, 68, who has a brain tumor, said he called in trying to get ahold of his own longtime physician, Dr. Paul Jacobson.
But instead of scheduling him an appointment with Dr. Jacobson, Jack said the clinic receptionist told him if he didn’t sign a pledge not to use medicinal cannabis, he wouldn’t receive any medical care.
Jack said he then called a higher-ranking administrator, and got the same brush-off.
The Record reports that in an earlier email to the newspaper, Rosado had admitted asking patients to sign the form, claiming it was something “recommended” by the American Academy of Pain Medicine in when patients receive narcotic painkillers.
How, exactly, the patients are helped by preventing them from using the most effective non-toxic alternative to narcotics hasn’t, of course, been explained — and don’t hold your breath waiting for that to happen.
While Dr. Rosado claims in the email that there is “a huge problem with patients who take prescribed pain medicines while also abusing illegal substances,” he neglects to mention that medical marijuana is legal in California.
Patients who sign the form must agree to random drug testing and can be discharged from care if they test positive for marijuana — even legal, medicinal cannabis.
The anti-pot Dr. Rosado is in charge of the entire chain of Mark Twain clinics.
It seems the good doctor disagrees with many of the physicians in his employ when it come sto medical marijuana though, if stories from patients are to be believed.
Two patients told the Record that their physicians apologized to them later, after each of them had a conflict with Dr. Rosado over his anti-medical marijuana views.
No fewer than seven Calaveras County patients have contacted Collective Patient Resources, which advocates for medical marijuana patients, activist Thomas Liberty told the Record. All of them told of coming under pressure from clinic staff to sign a pledge not to use medicinal cannabis.
Dr. Rosado — who just joined the Mark Twain St. Joseph’s staff in May — appears determined to throw his considerable weight around on the medical marijuana issue. He appears to believe medical marijuana patients don’t deserve health care.
If you’d like to give Mark Twain St. Joseph’s Hospital “feedback and suggestions” (which they claim to value) about Dr. Rosado’s policy of denying care to medical marijuana patients, click here: https://www.marktwainhospital.org/Who_We_Are/Contact_Us/index.htm