4 docs accused of overprescribing drugs to patients

KOKOMO, Ind. (WISH) - The Indiana Attorney General’s Office announced it wants emergency suspensions for four doctors from the Wagoner Medical Center.

They are Dr. Don Wagoner, his wife Dr. Marilyn Wagoner, as well as Doctors Robert Brewer and William Terpstra. They have offices in Kokomo and Burlington.

The state attorney general's office said 12 to 14 patients have died as a result of unsafe mixes of too many types of prescriptions.The person who answered the phone at the Kokomo office said they have no comment.

A representative inside the Burlington office also gave no comment.

“Evidence revealed that the practices of these doctors pose a clear danger to their patients and the public,” said Gabrielle Owens, Deputy Director of the Attorney General’s Licensing Enforcement and Homeowner Protection Unit. “These types of aggressive prescribing practices can lead to diversion, abuse and addiction. Our office has worked diligently to bring these actions quickly in order to ensure patients are protected while formal licensing complaints are being completed.”

Deputy Attorney General Jessica Krug said overprescribing is concerning but not necessarily unique.            

Since January 2012, the Attorney General's Office said is has filed about ten licensing actions against doctors for over prescribing with several cases involving deaths.

“We're finding instances here in the state where physicians are either uneducated or undereducated in areas of pain management or the use of these medications and that it causing issues for our citizens," said Krug. 

"We want people to be safe, we want ppl to go into their physician's office and trust that their physician knows what they're doing, that they have patient safety as their main guidepost and that they're going to receive exactly the type of care that they should based on the current standard of medicine.”The board will consider all four of the petitions for summary suspension at its next meeting on March 27.

Each doctor will have a chance to respond then.

If the suspension is granted, a spokesperson for the Attorney General’s Office said the 90-day period would give them to time to prepare a formal complaint.