Senate Testimony - 2/21/01

I would like to add a few comments in response to Gary Thune's beating  he gave me today. This is the third time he has bashed me publicly at hearings in the past few weeks. I have tried to point out the big picture  and the problems with the board system in North Dakota. Unfortunately, Gary Thune has repeatedly insisted that this is a single person who is unhappy with some fair discipline. I am not the only person who is a witness of the abuse of power of this Board. I just happen to be the person who has seen the worst of the abuse.

The American Podiatric Medical Association has been in the process of investigating the North Dakota Podiatry Board members for unethical activities in relationship to their actions they have taken against me. To confirm this please contact the APMA headquarters at 301-581-9221. Werner Strupp is the APMA's attorney.

Gary Thune mentioned that there have been 25 complaints against me over the past 7-8 years. He failed to mention that 22 of those 25 complaints were sent to the Board by direct local competitors or by Aaron Olson himself telling patients to send in complaints against me. If there was a conflict of interest statement and the Board looked at complaints realistically those 22 complaints would have never been looked at twice. Olson can hide behind a complaint but his fingerprints are on them.

Gary Thune mentioned that they are currently in the process of going forward with formal complaints against me regarding four patients. Of those four patients three were seeing Olson at the time they sent in their complaints. The other was seeing a close friend and previous Board member who has worked to keep Podiatrists out of his area  for years.

The scenario has been played our repeatedly; the patient is targeted by Doctor X  and then he convinces the patient that they have a problem that is much more serious than it really is; next he tells them that they have permanent damage and the final icing on the cake is that he tells them that there is nothing that anyone can do for them.

We as a society are conditioned to trust and believe what a doctor tells us. Moreover we are conditioned to believe that doctors are ethical and honest and have the patient's best interest in mind at all times. I believe that most doctors follow these rules of ethics but others are overwhelmed with the obsession of having more money and power and will go to extremes to try to pay for their escalating overhead and to increase their revenues since they are being paid less due to the constant insurance cuts that have taken over medicine in general over the past several years.

In response to Gary Thune's statement that I am no different than most criminals, I would like to point out that the legal system in our country is not perfect as Gary Thune seems to want you to believe. For example, 96 inmates on death row were recently allowed out of jail after DNA testing proved their innocence.

In closing, I believe that its important for you to understand that it is impossible for the local competitors to actually compete with me in a true sense. This is because I have more training than they do. I completed a four year residency program for reconstructive foot and ankle surgery. I was the first person to complete this program in the United States and it's the only program of its kind anywhere. I was the first of six people in the United States to become board certified in ankle and reconstructive surgery.

These credentials don't come easily. They certainly aren't achieved by being incompetent. There is either something wrong with my residency directors and everyone who gave me the oral and written tests and all the thousands of patients who are extremely satisfied with the care I have given them or this is a SHAM.

The local competitors can't compete with me so they had to find a different way to get rid of me. They saw the writing on the wall. I was beginning to build a huge practice with excellent results and a great reputation. There was no other way to deal with me except to go after me by using the peer review system to attack me. It's nothing new. It's being done everywhere as I stated in my testimony.

Don't forget that the best heart surgeons have the greatest amount of patients that die because those doctors are the ones who take on the most difficult cases that no one else is willing to try to help. There is no difference in my situation. I may have some less than perfect results but I would gladly compare my results against anyone else's,  especially the local competition.

The people of North Dakota are losing in this game. The standard of care stays the same as it improves everywhere else.

Thank you.

Brian Gale, DPM, FACFAS