What would you do if your Lyme doctor lost his license and no other doctor would treat your chronic Lyme disease?

As frightening and unbelievable as this might sound, it has already happened to Lyme disease patients in other parts of the country. It will soon happen in NYS if we do not fight for our right to treatment by lobbying for immediate passage of two bills to protect our doctors from persecution by the NYS Office of Professional Medical Conduct (OPMC), the medical disciplining board of the Department of Health.

Because the NYS legislative session ends in late June and does not begin again until January 2004, it is URGENT that all concerned NYS citizens sign up to lobby on May 6th for passage of these bills.

THE ISSUE:
Harassment by insurance companies and by the OPMC has left NYS, the state with the most cases of Lyme disease in the country, with only a dozen doctors who will treat chronic Lyme disease with more than the four week cookbook treatment.

In recent years, fully TWO THIRDS of those doctors have been under investigation for "medical misconduct" by the OPMC. This harassment is ongoing and has, thus far, led to the revocation of the license of one physician and the expenditure of hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees by the physicians investigated.

The chilling effect throughout the country has led to an unwillingness of physicians to treat chronic Lyme disease.

THE SOLUTION:
Through intense grass roots activism, Lyme disease patients have gotten two bills introduced into the legislature that will protect chronic Lyme doctors from unjust prosecution.  Now we need to get these bills passed.

1) The Gottfried bill reforms the OPMC so that all physicians would be given due process rights to defend themselves. (Under current OPMC laws, physicians do not have the basic civil rights that we take for granted in courts of law.)
2) The Mayersohn bill prohibits the OPMC from charging doctors with medical misconduct solely because they treat Lyme disease with long-term antibiotics.