Morris responds to pharmacy board discipline

The pharmacist license of 140th District Rep. Lynn Morris, R-Nixa, is on probation for the next three years following disciplinary actions handed down in March by the Missouri Board of Pharmacy.

Morris’ probation is related to 32 prescriptions written by the Family Pharmacy Inc. owner and other pharmacists at three stores between 2010 and 2013 under the name of Nixa-based physician Dr. Randall Halley. According to the settlements, Halley did not authorize the prescriptions or examine those receiving them.

“It was just antibiotics, anti-nausea and anti-diarrhea medicine, or if you needed an antihistamine or something like that, we could prescribe cough and cold medicines. That’s all it was,” Morris said.

“We did that for a good year and a half and never had an issue.”

Morris said the prescriptions, of which 18 mentioned in the settlement complaint name Morris as the responsible pharmacist, stem from an unwritten protocol he and Halley agreed to in 2010 wherein Morris prescribed medications for sick employees at Family Pharmacy stores in Ozark and Nixa and reported them back to Halley.

Andrea Harp, spokeswoman for Ozark Community Hospital where Halley is on staff, said via email the doctor cooperated with the investigation, and it would not be appropriate for him to comment further. The governing body for licensed physicians, the Missouri Board for Registration for the Healing Arts, has taken no disciplinary actions against Halley, according to a spokesman.

Pharmacy board spokesman Chris Cline said the state group plans no further investigations.

“As far as the board is concerned, it is a closed matter at this time,” Cline said.

The state board’s actions against Morris and Family Pharmacy are among 11 pharmacists and 12 pharmacies placed on probation in fiscal 2015, which ends June 30. In fiscal 2014, six pharmacist licenses and nine pharmacy permits were placed on probation, according to the pharmacy board’s annual report.

Investigations
Morris said shortly after a Joplin-area Family Pharmacy employee was fired in 2012 for unrelated reasons, state and federal agencies conducted an audit of the company and found no discrepancies in its practices. He said a state pharmacy board inspector informed him the inspections were prompted by an undisclosed employee’s call.

After receiving a letter from the same inspector that a physician needed to physically examine patients in order for prescriptions to be written and filled, Morris said the company ceased writing the unauthorized prescriptions.

In 2013, Morris said a Springfield-area store employee he declined to name was caught writing an unauthorized prescription and told the store pharmacist Morris authorized the action. Morris said the pharmacist then contacted Family Pharmacy’s corporate office to verify and found that claim to be false. Upon review of the store’s system, the incident was found to be a repeated occurrence, which resulted in the employee’s termination. Morris said the company self-reported the incident to the pharmacy board, and three weeks later another inspector arrived to conduct an investigation of all Family Pharmacy sites.

“I didn’t think I had anything to worry about because this arrangement the doctor and I had was just about Ozark and Nixa. I knew I hadn’t done anything else at any of the other stores,” Morris said, adding he was surprised to learn similar incidents occurred at stores in Rogersville, Springfield and Ozark.

He said it was later determined Ozark and Nixa traveling pharmacy technicians carried on the practice covering shifts at other stores.

“Unfortunately whether you like it or not, if you’re a business owner – and certainly the way the state board of pharmacy looks at things – when you’re an employer and an employee does something wrong, they usually get cited themselves and you get cited as an owner,” Morris said. “I accept the responsibility for my stores because the buck always stops with me.”

Although Morris on March 24 signed the settlement complaint against him and the settlement agreements against the three pharmacies, he now disputes certain statements in the agreement and plans to address expunging some of the information from the record when he meets pharmacy board Executive Director Kimberly Grinston on June 17.

According to Morris, the disputed items include the listing of his personal medications, two of which he said were precautionary medicines prescribed by Halley prior to a Morris family trip to Mexico. Morris said he does not know how a cephalexin prescription for his dog, reportedly prescribed by veterinarian Paul Nelson of Country Hills Animal Hospital in Ozark, came to be included in the complaint. Nelson confirmed he treats Morris’ dog, but declined to comment further, citing medical history as client-privileged information.

Conditions of probation
Morris doesn’t believe the conditions of his probation, which went into effect April 17, will affect his ownership of the business or his political position.

“I can’t be a pharmacist-in-charge, but I’m not a pharmacist-in-charge,” Morris said, adding he serves as a part-time relief pharmacist as needed. “The only other thing is I can’t give immunizations during that time, and I am going to talk to the director of the state board about that.”

Also under the three-year probation, the cited pharmacies – 4728 S. Campbell Ave., Ste. 132, 1156 W. Jackson St. in Ozark and 432 S. Mill St. in Rogersville – can’t provide training to interns. Morris, who said over 30 interns have graduated from pharmacy school while working for Family Pharmacy, is further prevented from serving as a trainer.

“I will still help students in any way that I can. I just won’t be able to do it through a preceptor,” Morris said. “It doesn’t mean I won’t counsel or advise, or work with and encourage people.”

Morris said he does not know how or why his probation became newsworthy in recent weeks but believes it was politically motivated, adding employees of three television stations reporting on the incident told him they had received anonymous phone tips.

“The blessing for this is I’m going to work twice as hard to get re-elected to prove my worthiness to people,” Morris said. “Now it doesn’t mean that I didn’t do something wrong, and I’m willing to accept the responsibility. I don’t like it and I don’t think it’s necessarily fair, but I don’t make the rules and I have to follow the rules.”[[In-content Ad]]