Sunday, May 15, 2005

Licensed To Do Damage

Why would you even give this guy a dog license?


FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) - A chiropractor who owned the clinic where four people were paralyzed after they were injected with the raw botulism toxin instead of the anti-wrinkle drug Botox has regained his suspended license.

Thomas Toia was placed on supervised probation for three years and ordered to pay a $10,000 fine, but the Florida Board of Chiropractic Medicine ruled Friday that he could begin seeing patients again.

The board made its decision after finding that Toia hired questionable doctors, barely supervised them and offered little help when the four got sick in November.

A doctor at Toia's clinic, Bach McComb, injected himself, his girlfriend and two friends with a super-strength, unapproved research toxin he bought as a cheap alternative to federally approved Botox. McComb did not properly dilute the toxin, paralyzing the four for months, officials said.

The board ruled Toia allowed McComb to practice medicine knowing his license was suspended at the time for over-prescribing painkillers. But Toia was unaware that McComb and Toia's son, a clinic assistant, ordered the raw toxin and that McComb gave the shots, the state said.


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