Aggressive marketing is one piece of it. I swear he didnt look at my leg for 30 seconds, and he told me exactly what it was, he says. The scenes are meant to serve as a testament to the effectiveness of Youngs work hard, play harder ethos. Then it rewinds into nothingness.). But, in theory, there should have been a check on all this. Similarly, Young appeared to get the benefit of the doubt from virtually everyone. (A meandering guitar melody enters the background. Alperovichs lawyer declined to comment.). Multiple surveys show that people tend to trust health-care workers more than they trust many other professionals, including police officers and clergy members. Moreover, throwing some glimpse of lights to his personal life, Dr. Jeff is a happily married man. Khazan: So Ive written a million stories about this. One story I found in a letter from Jeffs nursing-board case stuck with me. They just, like, keep their distance from you. The agents seized about 350 of Youngs patient charts and every computer in the office, according to Gutgsell, the former office manager, and the notice of seizure states that about 10,000 individual doses of hydrocodone were also taken. He raises a glass filled with red wine, as if in a toast. Young was a people pleaser, as one former employee described him. Khazan: Not long after Jeff opened Preventagenix, the Tennessee nursing board started to investigate him for prescribing high doses of opioids to his patients, even when he didnt have a good medical reason. Young: (Just after another person laughs.) Longoria: Opioids would be a new kind of painkiller to treat not just acute pain after an event like a surgery, but also pain that was more mundane, like chronic back pain that patients would complain about for years, but which doctors didnt have a clear cure for. It really meant a lot to me. Thats okay. In addition to steroid shots, Young prescribed her oxycodone, Xanax, and Adderall for her various medical issues. ), (The intro to a rock song plays, with a driving, pulsing beat. Every time. She appreciated that he asked about her grandkids. Young got married, then quickly got divorced, according to several people who knew him then. A staffer, who declined to talk on the record, asked me why I was writing about him. Hey, are you paying attention? Occasionally he would glare at his ex-wife Dawn, who was in the gallery. * This article has been clarified to more accurately convey the details of Gutgsell's plea. Jeff refilled M.Y.s prescriptions for Percocet and Valium and gave him a new one for hydrocodone. This distinction is important, because while nurse practitioners are functioning in the same capacity as physiciansordering and interpreting Were going to take the worst of the worst. Young had also allegedly begun siphoning off $100 almost every day from the clinic for his personal expenses, according to former employees. He soon opened a new clinic, which he called GeneXis Health. Naylor: My husband hadnt been to a doctor in years. Later that month, M.Y. His case before the nursing board stalled for two more years. Hes so cute thats my brother and my best friend, Young says, giving Phillips a gentle kiss. Jeffrey Young was one of those people. He seemed, to his former employees, constitutionally unable to deny patients the pills they wanted, even if it was the last thing they needed. Khazan: He worked in the timber industry, and one day at work, he got overheated and disoriented. Jackson nurse practitioner Jeffrey Young will await his opioid trafficking trial in jail, an appeals court decided Thursday. We put out calls and emails to dozens of Jeff Youngs patients. Purdue voice-over: Often, it will be an opioid medication. He blasted heavy metal at his private practice and filled his Instagram feed with photos of himself smoking cigars. Calles: I mean, the whole deal of him being in jail this long is completely unfair. Khazan: In his Periscope videos, Jeff insisted it was all fun and games, and people were just criticizing him because of his style. He tied the knot with his beautiful wife Dr. Petra. The next year, Jeff prescribed M.Y. The self-proclaimed "Rock Doc" is accused of trading powerful . Sometimes the two men would fight, and broken glass would litter the floor. 0:04. Youre just probably not feeling good. But they never believed us. He has been arrested several times, though not convicted, for assaulting women. Patel left soon after. The man says if he were ever shot, he would go to Young before going to the hospital. He invited a cameraman to document his life and eventually had it edited into a pilot for a reality-TV show. But you know what? To date, none of the alleged victims in Youngs court case has come forward publicly to speak against him. By 2012, Young was allegedly supplying testosterone without a clear medical reason to high schoolers who wanted to bulk up. Im too good for you because I got this money, or whatever. Jackson nurse-practitioner Jeffrey Young, known as the "Rock Doc," was released on bond and will be allowed to continue treating patients, a federal judge ruled Thursday. During one club night, Young bought Stephanie two drinks and his friends handed them to her. The manufacturers and distributors of prescription opioids have been sued by dozens of states and municipalities for the damage theyve allegedly caused. (One employee, Karla Wright, testified later that she had never seen Young have sex with women at the office. Of course other doctors dont write as many prescriptions, the implication seemed to be. Stephanie had been in an abusive relationship and dealt with a slew of other traumas. To a different patient, he wrote, Come fuck me at my office right now., It is not illegal for doctors to have sex with their patients, though its considered unethical. Minutes after finishing the second drink, Stephanie fell face-first onto the floor. So, no, I cant say that. The next morning, the office manager, Kristie Gutgsell, would clean up after them. You know that. It fit neatly, at least, into a story I was already really familiar with: It was the greedy provider who was allegedly taking advantage of his patients. Hows it going? (Fades under.). Federal prosecutors who charged him in a massive opioid bust say he overprescribed painkillers, often for money, notoriety, and sexual favors.. MY died on August 25, 2015, from an apparent drug overdose. The men each contributed $40,000 to the endeavor. This is Aalto. We wont know if Young is guilty of everything the government says he is, or how much additional time, if any, he will serve, until later this year. You may not like my rock and roll, you may not like my piercings, you may not like my sexy-ass beard, but you know what? The half-dozen former patients who did agree to talk with me were mostly people who wanted to defend Jeff. ), Youngs sexual desires and need to please patients allegedly soon blurred together. Occupation (s) Guitarist. And people in the pilot gave testimonials saying as much. Young began arriving at the clinic smelling rancid, with greasy hair, and the clinics money problems mounted. It surprised her, but Jeff was attuned to all that. I mean, he had his doctors lab coat on. He found diseases, for example, that other doctors missed. Will be glad to take the balance out of your ass. He asked another patient, to whom he prescribed the opioid hydrocodone, to come in for a checkup the following day and wear a short skirt and no panties., Young was sometimes even more direct. Khazan: This is Tanya Ballard. Additional audio from Purdue Pharma, The Rock Doc TV Show, @JY2RocDoc, and Bat Pig Pictures. Despite some patients praise for Young, the evidence that he routinely walked far over that line remains alarming. 1986-present. Many told me that they didnt want to talk on the record. Young: All right. (A long moment of music with no narration before it fades out. I asked to speak with him for this story, but because of a gag order on the case, his lawyer declined interviews with me. Jeffrey Youngs patients say he helped them like nobody else could, but prosecutors indicted him following a huge painkiller bust. They entered the office and ordered the clinics staffers to lie on the floor. 1:32. She told me that while she was a patient at the clinic, she had a front-row seat to Preventagenix getting more and more popular. He wasnt in pain. every time. He has pleaded not guilty to all the charges against him. Actually very nice, yeah. Theres this moment in one of the videos that I keep thinking about: Young: (Over more pool filtration.) Copyright 2021 The Atlantic and New York Public Radio. The cameraman who shot the pilot, who requested anonymity because he doesnt want to be associated with Youngs case, heard about Young through a mutual friend and visited him several times to shoot footage for what he hoped could become a reality show. He didnt mind saying a curse word or two.. Always have been for the patient. Toward the end of PreventaGenix, the nurse practitioner so many people had praised deteriorated, according to former employees. Find Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and TikTok profiles, images and more on IDCrawl - free people search website. And Im like, Oh. [A beat.] So what? Scott Deberry: You go to the doctor, and you tell them whats wrong with you, and they look at you like, Oh, its nothing. (A shudder, a gasp, then clapping and bubbling evolve into a background track.). Whether or not Young is convicted, the perverse incentives for doctors to see patients for short visits and to prescribe too many unnecessary drugs will remain. But the board has a history of letting suspicious providers go on practicing for years. Do you feel safe with Mr. Young being out there? a prosecutor on the case, Andrew Pennebaker, asked Pickering in court. They didnt play Stairway to Heaven or have Periscope accounts. And you can kind of look at it like locker-room talk . As many as three women a day allegedly came to his office for sex, though one former employee said Young might have had sex with more women after hours. They didnt try to become reality-TV stars. Khazan: There was this really big series of indictments that came down in 2019 where the federal government said, You know what? 40 members in the TDBauto community. Patients, meanwhile, dont always know that medical boards exist in the first place, or that they can complain to them if theyve been wronged, Lisa Robin, the chief advocacy officer for the Federation of State Medical Boards, says. Others accused me of seeking to discredit Young and slander his name. A Professional theme for architects, construction and interior designers I visited Youngs clinic, but, through a staffer, he declined to speak with me. He refilled MYs prescriptions for Percocet and Valium, and also prescribed him hydrocodone. How far can medical providers go in giving patients what they want? Thats the only way you can describe it. Ballard: I dont believe Jeff overprescribed medication. The week that followed Martin Luther King Jr.s assassination was revolutionaryso why was it nearly forgotten? Because he prescribed my opiates, and I took them as prescribed, and I had no problems with it. Though the system came slowly for Young, during the years he was being investigated America underwent a national reckoning about opioids. I had a lot of Why on earth? questions, the Atlantic reporter Olga Khazan says. As Young collected more tattoos and befriended more local bands, he began to attract a certain clientele. (Lo-fi synthesizer music plays up. He would still be allowed to prescribe testosterone and cough syrup with codeine, however. His Rock Doc persona helped him connect with patients who might never have felt comfortable in a traditional doctors office. Khazan: In 2017, the very public world Jeff had built around himself started attracting a different kind of attention. (The background music shifts tone dramatically to a wispy, light, contemplative energy.). The nurse practitioner Jeffrey Young produced a reality-TV pilot in which he branded himself "the Rock Doc., The week that followed Martin Luther King Jr.s assassination was revolutionaryso why was it nearly forgotten? #saturdays at noon est to hear #nikkidarling chat with the #RockDoc Jeff Young II #musicmeetmedicine Starts at 12pm est. Jacksons cheeriness, though, is at odds with the populations somewhat grim physical health. His friend Melanie Lupino, a local bartender, said he got girlfriends easily, so she was baffled by the notion that he would have to give people drugs to get sex. His black shirt collar didnt quite hide the tattoos on the back of his neck. Khazan: So, like, that doctor-patient interaction and how the opioids actually got prescribed. (The drugmaker that is most often blamed for the epidemic doesnt agree with this assessment: Suggesting that activities that last occurred more than 16 years ago are responsible for todays complex and multifaceted opioid crisis is deeply flawed, a Purdue Pharma spokesperson, Robert Josephson, said in a statement to The New York Times for a story on this issue.). Still, the citys southernness peeks through. And now we see the result. Years before the launch of PreventaGenix, Young had already been accused of abusing his nurse-practitioner license. Though both she and Reaves said Young should be held accountable for anything he did wrong, Stephanie told me that she forgave him. Theres clear evidence that opioid manufacturers knew the drugs were addictive, yet they marketed them aggressively anyway. Dan Reaves, a local radio host on whose show Young occasionally appeared as part of a marketing plan, described Young as medically gifted. The cause of death, according to the letter, was a probable cardiac event due to polypharmacy, or the simultaneous use of multiple drugs.. Women were drawn to Young; he had a big house and was the first to buy everyones drink. Its joined at points by a line of harmony played on a synthesizer.). Many medical providers are small-business owners who operate with limited oversight from authorities. ), Jeff Young: Are we live? One of the differences between physicians and nurse practitioners is that physicians are regulated by a state Board of Medicine, while in most states, nurse practitioners are regulated by a state Board of Nursing. Music by Tasty Morsels and Nelson Nance. Aw, shit! [Khazan laughs, then Calles emphasizes each word that follows.] Trust me, I got people, he says to the camera. Khazan: Which was exactly what she liked about him. The sharpteeth charge through and run into the rock spire and fall down. But one thing that I was really curious about is how you actually went from having opioids being a thing that existed to having opioids be a thing that existed in peoples medicine cabinets. Longoria: The indictment against the Rock Doc alleges that he prescribed more than a million addictive pills, treated patients while intoxicated, and used his prescribing power to have sex with womenincluding women who were his patients. So hes a little out there. For the cosmetically minded, he hosted alcohol-fueled Botox parties. The allegations against Young point toward an especially sordid type of abuse in which some doctors victimize patients twice: first by getting them addicted to drugs, and then by sexually exploiting them. You ready? The feds say Young . Khazan: Does that change how you feel about him? This striking 6ft 3in person embodies kanji tattoos on his biceps, and the effortlessly cool personality will describe how one sees him. 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