DOCTOR LOSES LICENSE FOR YEAR

RALEIGH - In a move that was "one step away" from the worst punishment
available, the N.C. Medical Board imposed a minimum one-year suspension
against Dr. Joseph Talley for breaching care standards in his treatment of
pain patients with high dosages of narcotics.

Talley, who turns 65 on Saturday, may effectively be out of business after
practicing since 1969 in the small textile mill village of Grover, on the
South Carolina line.

"When the board brought its charges and published them, they imposed the
punishment and carried it out," Talley testified during his sentencing
hearing Thursday before the board rendered its judgment. "The damage was
done. My career is gone. My financial security is gone. My reputation is gone."

Still, Talley remained unrepentant.

"I am not hear to beg your indulgence," he said. "I continue to assert that
I did right."

The board could have revoked Talley's license, which would have prohibited
him from practicing medicine in North Carolina for at least two years
before petitioning for a new license. With the suspension, which the board
imposed for a minimum of one year, Talley can seek reinstatement in half
that time.

Still, Talley's lawyer said, the decision was devastating. "You can't call
it a victory in any respect," Robert Clay said. "It is one step away from
the death penalty. All it does is shorten the period of time before he can
reapply for his license."

Talley appeared tired and irritable after the hearing. In a brief statement
before television cameras outside the medical board's office, he stood with
his family at his side and answered reporters' questions with
uncharacteristic one-word responses.

His daughter, Margaret Talley-Seijn, said the legal ordeals over her
father's prescribing practices have taken a toll on the family.

"This has been very, very hard," Talley-Seijn said, adding that no one had
yet contemplated what the next move would be, nor whether Talley would seek
reinstatement in a year.

Talley's troubles began last October, when the board issued charges against
him for his treatment of patients with pain. His practice, in a small
office across the street from a bedspread factory, was a heavy prescriber
of narcotics such as morphine, methadone and OxyContin.

Patients drove from far and near because Talley was willing to prescribe
the drugs at dosages pain patients said no other doctors would consider.
Several patients testified Thursday before the board, crediting Talley with
saving their lives.

"Dr. Talley gave me my life back," said Jerry W. Gray, who drove to Grover
from Clarksville, Tenn., to see Talley. "My every waking moment was
consumed by trying to find some way to ease the pain."

Talley put him on morphine, and he was able to remarry after his first wife
died, and resume a more normal life.

But Talley's fate was all but decided. In March, after a three-day hearing
that resembled a trial, the board found Talley guilty of deviating from
accepted standards of care for routinely failing to perform physical exams
on patients before prescribing the powerful drugs. It also faulted him for
failing to properly monitor patients for drug compliance and signs of
addiction.

That ruling meant Talley faced two possible punishments: revocation of his
license, or a suspension for some period of time.

Revocations are rare. Last year, the board revoked eight medical licenses,
but in each of those cases, the doctors practiced in other states, and only
had their North Carolina privileges yanked as a result of punishments taken
in their home states.

Another 13 doctors had their licenses suspended, but eight of them were
allowed to continue practicing by consenting to certain conditions. Five
more doctors' licenses were summarily suspended, meaning they had to quit
practicing until the charges against them could be aired.

Talley had all but ended his practice in January, when the Drug Enforcement
Administration withdrew his registration number to prescribe controlled
substances. Most of Talley's practice involved such prescriptions,
primarily for pain management.

He has maintained that his general practice was transformed to one that
concentrated on pain management because he was not afraid to put people on
large doses of narcotics, including OxyContin. As a result, he said, pain
patients spread the word about him and others began seeking him out.

But the DEA contends that many of Talley's patients were not pain suffers,
but were instead drug abusers and traffickers. In its Jan. 28 order
suspending Talley's controlled substance registration, the DEA alleged that
at least 23 of Talley's former patients "have died, in part, due to drug
overdoses."

Talley is concerned that the DEA will seek a criminal indictment against
him, and he has hired a lawyer in Charlotte. The DEA has precedent. In
March, a Florida doctor was sentenced to 63 years in federal prison for
prescribing large quantities of narcotic pain relievers to four patients
who later died of drug overdoses.