Word: montanas
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...cold morning last April, in the shadow of Montana's Beartooth Mountain range, five agents from the federal Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) walked into the office of Dr. Richard Nelson, a Billings neurologist. For six hours, they combed through his records, seizing 72 patient charts and confiscating his drug-dispensing permit. The charge? None so far, but the assumption is that he is suspected of improperly prescribing narcotic drugs. Despite a distinguished professional record spanning more than four decades, Nelson has had to spend $20,000 on lawyers, fearing that the government will indict him if it turns out that...
...national debate plays out, Nelson, the Montana neurologist, remains under investigation. He describes himself as a cautious prescriber. A graduate of Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, he also trained with the American Academy of Pain Medicine. He required that his patients sign a four-page, 21-item contract before getting any opioid treatment, pledging, for example, that they had never received a diagnosis of substance abuse or been involved in drug dealing, that they would not seek to replace lost medication or obtain early refills and that they would buy their drugs from only one designated pharmacy...
...guessing. Some of Nelson's patients have suffered acute narcotic-withdrawal symptoms, as he was unable to wean them gradually. Others, unable to cope with their pain, lost their jobs. They have staged demonstrations and press conferences in downtown Billings and mounted petition drives. As one of the few Montana doctors offering opioid therapy, Nelson was "like the Mother Teresa of medicine," says Jeannie Huntley, a marketing consultant who suffered brain and neck injuries from a car crash...
...knows yet if any of Nelson's patients may have overdosed or illegally sold their meds--and the DEA is keeping mum. But even if he is eventually absolved, the Montana native plans to close his practice. "We thought we were doing everything just about right," he says. "But now a whole bunch of people are sitting out there hurting like hell." --With reporting by Pat Dawson/Billings
...DIED. CHARLES KEELING, 77, tenacious climate scientist and conservationist whose precise measurements of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere over five decades became the undisputed basis for global warming concerns; in Hamilton, Montana. Although many had once assumed that the oceans and plants would absorb all the gas emissions from cars and factories, his so-called Keeling Curve has charted consistent annual increases in carbon dioxide in different locations since the mid-1950s?a pattern clearly linked to humans' increased consumption of fossil fuels, which release carbon dioxide when burned...