Posted on 07/20/2018 5:05:50 AM PDT by GailA
Robert D. Rose Jr. implored a federal judge Tuesday to consider the plight of military veterans denied relief from chronic pain by the Department of Veterans Affairs as a result of recent VA policies drastically limiting the amount and type of opioid-based pain medications prescribed for treatment.
U.S. District Judge Travis R. McDonough listened to impassioned arguments by Rose in support of an injunction he filed that could have opened the possibility of other veterans seeking legal options to being denied long-prescribed opioid medications. McDonaugh also heard responses from government attorneys who maintained the VA is rightly following recent federal policy in weaning many veterans off opioid-based medications.
McDonough denied issuing an injunction, saying that Rose offered insufficient proof, effectively narrowing the scope of the lawsuit filed last year to Rose vs. the Mountain Home VA Medical Center and releasing a number of doctors and other defendants initially named in the November 2017 civil action.
Rose, 52, of Gray, said he continues to suffer debilitating pain since being tapered off opioid pain medications beginning in 2016 for chronic medical conditions connected to his service as a Marine. He maintains VA policies drastically affect his quality of life, along with many other veterans now compelled to seek alternate methods of pain relief.
Chattanooga-based McDonough also set a July 2019 trial date for the lawsuit. The case will be heard in U.S. District Court in Greeneville.
“I’m not going to stop fighting this,” Rose said Tuesday afternoon as he left the courtroom.
Rose sought to obtain an order from the judge to suspend the VA and Department of Defense policy tapering off prescription of opioid-based medications for former and current members of the military.
In his amended complaint, Rose made a number of legal claims naming as defendants the U.S government, the VA and individual medical providers who treated him, along with U.S. Rep. Phil Roe, who was earlier excused by McDonough from attending the hearing.
Government lawyers maintained at the hearing that Rose alleged no “viable cause of action” against the defendants. For purposes of the injunction sought, McDonough agreed.
McDonough said while announcing his ruling on one of the allegations that Rose “is not likely to win on the merit of his claims.”
Rose said he cannot afford a lawyer and represents himself. Assistant U.S. attorneys Kenny L. Saffles and M. Kent Anderson represented the government.
Rose’s legal arguments cover a wide range of legal territory, including various constitutional violations, violation of the Medicare Act, violation of the Proxmire Act that likens the alleged actions of the VA and other defendants to “genocide,” violation of international treaties signed by the U.S. that cover humanitarian law, violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act, medical malpractice, and alleged libel and slander.
Rose named Roe in the lawsuit, but McDonough said after a teleconference earlier this week that the congressman did not have to appear at the hearing because his is not directly connected to the VA. Roe, chairman of the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs and a medical doctor, called lawsuit allegations about him “frivolous” in a court document.
Rose told McDonough in court that the VA opioid policy affecting him and many others puts veterans in the same category as habitual drug users and is “unjustifiable.”
“They’re doing this the same way they did Agent Orange. They ignored it and denied it for 30 years,” Rose said.
He cited rising suicide rates among veterans and said federal figures for prescribed opioid overdoses are inflated, while the overdose rates for powerful drugs purchased on the street like heroin and fentanyl on the streets continue to rise.
The stricter VA policy is “a death sentence for people like me and (others),” Rose said.
“You have a power. You’re a federal judge,” Rose told McDonough. “You can save lives. The choice is yours.”
Rose was told in 2016 by a VA provider that his prescription for morphine would gradually “taper” and then be stopped.
Rose answered in the affirmative when asked by Saffles if he has seen a private physician since last year after obtaining insurance. He is prescribed some medication that helps his health conditions, but not at the level he received from the VA to mitigate constant pain.
Rose denied breaking a “pain contract” he signed with the VA in 2016, and challenged Saffles to produce proof that showed he did.
Rose obtained private insurance in July 2017.
“It took that long because I was thinking the VA had my best interests in mind. They did not,” he said.
The Marine veteran who suffered a debilitating service-related injury filed the lawsuit last year in U.S. District Court. It seeks a total of $350 million in damages from defendants that included employees of the Mountain Home Veterans’ Affairs Medical Center and Roe.
Rose, a former teacher who is now disabled, served in the Marine Corps from 1983 to 1994. He is now on 100 percent disability due to service-related injuries that affected his back, spine and legs and caused other complications that leave him in constant pain. He is also a diabetic and has other medical conditions.
Rose seeks personal damages of $100 million “for pain, suffering and extreme torment” since Nov. 1, 2016, “after being forced on pain medication taper on Oct. 15, 2016, as part of VA policies supported by (Roe),” the complaint said.
The civil rights violation lawsuit also asks for punitive damages of $250 million, with the amount to be placed in a trust to be used to provide free legal representation “to veterans and civilians being discriminated against by governmental agencies, medical and/or doctor offices and doctors to receive the best possible health care to include opioid-based medications for intractable pain” and education of doctors and the public of the need for opioids to treat certain conditions.
Tell her to stay off Tramadol. It has all of the hazards and none of the efficacy. Try to find a pain specialist, if she can. The government has no business standing between you and your doctor. There are no hard and fast rules when it comes to illness and pain.
It is torture, and it’s based on lies.
He is a beefier kind of guy
I got that t-shirt.
Praying for some relief for your sister.
This is the major, MAJOR issue I have (as you apparently do) with the “opioid crisis”.
Do some people prescribed the drug get addicted and occasionally overdose? Of course, and the number may be significant.
But the majority of people overdosing on these things are recreational users, and it really burns me that the people all up in arms about this, instead of concentrating on the people who abuse them and how to deal with them, instead make the medical community and the drug manufacturers the villain and attack them instead.
The end result is what we see here: People who actually need them, disabled veterans with injuries, people with cancer, etc. have a harder time getting them, have to pay more for them, have to drive further to get them, have to jump through more hoops to get them, and may have to make do with drugs that don’t relieve pain as well because they aren’t as addictive.
That is why this whole situation makes me angry. I have a degree of sympathy for addicts who need help and I think we should, but this is the end result of this outrage over an “opiod epidemic” that treats everyone using opioids the same way.
I just wonder, I used to hydrocodone, didn’t like it. Now I am using prescription strength ibuprofen. It is not working eel anymore. I’ve heard a lot about CBDI products and medical marijuana. Butyour I don’t want to go there. I don’t want to take stuff that alters myway mind.
This is NOT about sympathy.
This is about Quality of Life.
As far as dollar amounts you know as well as I and many others that in a Lawsuit one must always ask for a large amount because most awarded amounts are not what is asked for, it’s mostly going to be less.
Exactly right. I’m a little less politic since I’m afflicted with a chronic illness that is very painful, but the facts are easy to find. There has been no increase in opioid deaths once Fentanyl is properly excluded from the statistics. It’s a lie that prescriptions are causing this.
Now, I’m just as conversant in problems with over-prescribing addicting medication; however, sometimes there is no other option. The “safe” (patented and expensive) medications often don’t work or have the same or worse properties and side effects. It should be up to doctors and patients to figure out the best choice. Drug warriors and bureaucrats have business in my medicine cabinet (which,BTW, is empty).
CBD oil is made from hemp seeds and can not be officially and federally called ‘hemp’ unless it has less than 3/10ths of one percent THC and NO MORE. There are also CBD isolate products that are independently lab tested to contain no THC. CBD oil is not psychoactive and does not get you high or alter your consciousness in any way.
Maybe he put on a 100 lbs BECAUSE of his back and leg issues.
Wonder if his back and leg issues would improve if he dropped about 100 pounds.””
EXACTLY. Knew a guy who blamed EVERY single health issue he had on Agent Orange & his time in the Navy. Problem was-—he spent his entire tour of duty ON the ship OUT in the Ocean.
Then he had a ‘workmen’s Comp’ accident in his job. He wasn’t supposed to work on any payroll, and he got monthly chiropractic ‘adjustments’ and medical coverage for LIFE, etc.
He moved & ran into problems getting his ‘pain meds’.
So he goes to the VA & make a nuisance of himself there, and get more pain meds. Neither doc knows the other is prescribing meds. Thie guy starts making his own dosage times & amounts to stretch his supplies.
Enter the current levels of pain meds, and he jumps on that wagon, also. He is taking so many pain meds that his entire digestive tract is acting up & now the cure for that enters the picture. Suddenly, Activia Yogurt is his best friend.
Then the VA cut him off.....and I mean OFF. You should have heard him complain !!! His knees were bothering him. His back bothered him so much that was hunching over & constantly complaining.
In the midst of this-—especially in the past 2 years, he added over 110 pounds to his frame, so I confronted him about that....The extra weight HAD TO have an impact on his problems. I finally got out of the picture. Don’t talk to him anymore.
Government is wonderful, it fixes everything it touches.
Speaking from experience if the Body hurts too much it’s very difficult if not impossible for someone to exercise to lose weight.
Are you positive that He is overweight?
Do you know what His BMI is ?
He could just be a large framed Man.
Have you walked a mile in His shoes ?
I’ll second the motion that these scumbags making all these rules about taking Pain Meds away from those that actually need them need to be in PAIN 24/7/365(6), unable to sleep, play with Grandchildren, cook dinner safely, unlock and open a door, pickup dropped change from the floor, thread a needle and then sew something up and many other things most take for granted.
But most of all I want them to SUFFER CONSTANTLY !!! ALL DAY, ALL NIGHT !!!
And be told to just “go take some aspirin” or put alternating heat and cold on the affected area.
Tramadol=Pez Candy, does nothing for Pain.
As always, losing weight would help, it cant hurt.
But we don’t know his injury or condition. I am around 200 lbs, and would be best at 180 if I could get there, but...even going to the gym for a year three times a week, I got down to 193, and that was it. I did used to be 225 at one point, but for the past five years, have hovered between 200-205.
Not everyone has issues because they are simply overweight and not getting enough exercise. When you have bone on bone due to degenerative disease over time, or disks so compressed, bulging and disruption due to something like a crash in a helicopter (certainly possible for a former Marine) you can’t exercise effectively. Sure, he could have a better diet, but we all know that diet alone rarely produces weight loss, though it can.
I have had chronic back problems for forty years, all related to a high school football injury. I was able to join the Navy (never telling them of my injury) and managed to go four years without hitting sick call for it. After I got out, I was able to do all the things I wanted to, play sports, etc, was not overweight (5’9”, 170) but I had times where I literally could not walk.
I had to be bodily carried off a softball field as a twenty-something year old, couldn’t move my legs in a meaningful way, and couldn’t get out of bed for a week, had to pee and poop in a bedpan, and didn’t return to a normal low-pain baseline in a month or two.
When I got married, this happened often enough to alarm my wife, who had never seen this side of me while dating even though she knew of it. On one occasion, as a 30+ year old man, I walked into work taking six inch steps like Tim Conway and being bent over at a 40 degree angle (like an 85 year old man with a walker) and when I walked into an exam room that morning to work with a patient, the little old lady looked at me in alarm and blurted out before I even introduced myself “My God! I thought you were a patient here!” She had seen me coming into work through the lobby in that crippled state and thought I was a patient, not an employee. But I had to work and had patients on my schedule with nobody to pick them up, so...I had to go to work.
And working in medicine I know...never, Never, NEVER get back surgery unless you are absolutely, positively near the end of your physical and mental rope. There is too much potential for complications and unintentional harm.
Shortly after that, my wife asked if I had ever thought of trying something like chiropractic or acupuncture, so I decided out of desperation to try chiropractic. That has made more difference in my life than all the medical painkillers and physical therapy put together, and it isn’t even close. It has made my life as close to normal as I could expect.
Recently, I had a disk that bulged out and a piece broke off in my back, but...there wasn’t anything they could do about it, so it had to run its natural course.
The point is, I know that feeling of not being able to function, and when you actually ARE able to function with a low level of pain, I am hesitant to do ANYTHING physical that might exacerbate the problem. I stopped playing all sports, even throwing a frisbee, I do try to ride and walk, but simply stepping off a curb I don’t judge correctly can wreck my back.
Just a few weeks ago, that is just what happened, I stepped off a curb not seeing it and jolted my back. I have spent in the last several weeks nearly $500 out of pocket in chiropractor visits, and my back stopped responding to treatment. I began to get desperate, thinking this was it, I was going to have to go back in, get worked up all over again, and have surgery or fusions, and out of desperation, I purchased an inversion table. Even just using it for a few days so far has made a significant difference to me, so...this is something I am very hopeful for.
Sorry to blather on with this, but the back is like a tooth, when it aches, it can take over your life, which is what mine has done.
Then you need to turn that SOB in for Dealing Drugs!!!
It’s A$$holes like him that help screw over the rest of Us!!!
Large doses of Ibuprofen it BAD for Your Renal System.As in will cause Kidney Failure.
I have always avoided asking for pain medication, simply because I do feel that my personality is such that I could be addicted, and also because I fear I might be seen as seeking pain medication. (my wife rolled her eyes at me when I told her this)
Also, for some reason, things like Oxycodone simply don’t seem to have much effect on me. I take two of them, and the pain doesn’t go away, and I don’t have any pleasant sensations, which is kind of annoying.
Chiropractic and inversion has been my mainstay for the last 5 years and chiro was always my go to to settle things down for a week or two. Both tons more effective than opioids until lighting shoots out the top of your head. Tricare doesnt cover chiro so yeah, my money is spent trying to fell better as well.
My pinched nerve on my right side has me jerked so hard to starboard that its caused spine deformation/deterioration and a protruding synovial cyst @L-5 that HAD TO removed. Completely debilitated for several weeks before the cyst removal. I have kicked all the opiods since 3 months before my Thanksgiving surgery, and am at the Tim Conway stage of walking around 1 (thats ONE city block) every day I can. 6 inch curbs, landscape rocks and cracks in the sidewalk are hell!
Federal law, Reefer Madness and over 100 years of political lobby has squashed legitimate research into CBD and it benefits.
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