Dear Ms. DiAna:

I am responding as an individual to your recent email, which was delayed in getting to me.  You may reproduce, distribute, and promulgate my response.

November 3, 2006—I authored and submitted a request for investigation regarding an Ohio-licensed physician, Victoria Wells (Wulsin), License #35.058016, to the Ohio State Medical Board.  This was through their complaint process and involved several serious issues under Section 4731.22 of the Ohio Revised Code.  The request involved investigation regarding deviation from the standard of care, unprofessional conduct, and false and misleading advertising.  Specific examples were given and documented with the request.

I received a written reply from the Board that the matter had been referred for investigation.  The letter stated that active investigations are confidential, however, the letter went on to state that I would be notified at the conclusion of this investigation.  I have not been notified that this matter has been concluded, and thus this remains an open and active investigation.  I have been contacted on several occasions by Board investigators and, based on information I cannot reveal here, understand that this is still an active investigation.

While the specifics of this investigation are confidential, the issues that were brought to the Board’s attention for investigation are not.  They are quite serious, and include among them activities regarding highly questionable human experimentation conducted at an Ohio institution which receives federal funding.  These matters include, but are not limited to, use of unapproved biological agents in human experimentation, lack of informed consent in human experimentation, failure to treat patients with treatable diseases akin to the notorious, unethical Tuskegee experiments, alteration of reports, and violations of the Code of Federal Regulations.

Salient details of the Tuskegee experiments are described in a report from National Public Radio, excerpted below:

Nearly 400 poor black men with syphilis from Macon County, Ala., were enrolled in the study. They were never told they had syphilis, nor were they ever treated for it. According to the Centers for Disease Control, the men were told they were being treated for “bad blood,” a local term used to describe several illnesses, including syphilis, anemia and fatigue.

For participating in the study, the men were given free medical exams, free meals and free burial insurance.

At the start of the study, there was no proven treatment for syphilis. But even after penicillin became a standard cure for the disease in 1947, the medicine was withheld from the men. The Tuskegee scientists wanted to continue to study how the disease spreads and kills. The experiment lasted four decades, until public health workers leaked the story to the media.

By then, dozens of the men had died, and many wives and children had been infected.

The matters brought to the Ohio State Medical Board’s attention are entirely similar in substance.

Based on the information I have, in my opinion, Victoria Wells Wulsin’s released statement, “The Ohio State Medical Board has taken no action against Wulsin because the charges are false” is both false and misleading.  To my knowledge the State of Ohio has not made a finding in this case.  I made no “charges” against Victoria Wells Wulsin, but merely requested an investigation.  For her campaign to have used the terminology “charges” suggests that the Ohio State Medical Board has made formal charges against her.  As noted earlier, I have not been notified by the Ohio State Medical Board that their investigation has been concluded.

Robert S. Baratz, MD, PhD, DDS