Some of the pills had been prescribed by Young. He may have that, but hes not Hes down to earth. Youngs case provides a rare glimpse into the ways patients wind up addicted to the powerful painkillers fueling the national opioid epidemic. Jeffery Dale Young known as Dr. Jeff Young or Dr. Jeff is American Veterinarian and a reality TV actor. Moreover, throwing some glimpse of lights to his personal life, Dr. Jeff is a happily married man. The waiting room often overflowed with patients. (The synthesizer takes over the harmony, traipsing up and down the melody line before it quiets and the episode ends.). [Khazan laughs.] This is Aalto. Do you feel safe with Mr. Young being out there? a prosecutor on the case, Andrew Pennebaker, asked Pickering in court. Rudins lawyer did not respond to a request for comment. Calles: I just wasnt getting the care I needed. Its heavy, and it loops. The next year, Jeff prescribed M.Y. Jeff didnt monitor M.Y.s use, or talk to him about the danger of combining drugs. While Youngs antics could be a nightmare for his staff, his pool of patients increased as word about his practice spread. And most doctors youve seen, they give off this persona as like, Im too cool. Heres what I can tell you about the JY2, all right? Tanya Ballard: I think people are Just didnt like Jeff. Copyright 2021 The Atlantic and New York Public Radio. Theres actually a diagnosis called white-coat hypertension. Its when your blood pressure spikes in a doctors office because the whole experience is nerve-racking. 0:04. Jackson Sun. Because he prescribed my opiates, and I took them as prescribed, and I had no problems with it. (Soft percussive synthesizer music plays.). Were taking next week off to work on new stories, but well be back with new episodes starting April 15. the rock doc' jeff young. According to police reports and court records, his second ex-wife, Dawn, claimed that throughout their relationship Young repeatedly pushed, threatened, and attempted to rape her. He pleaded not guilty to the . And, to be honest, most of the time when you see a white male with a lot of tattoos, theyre usually not someone that hangs around with people of different races. Why didnt anyone try to put a stop to this? I just had a lot of questions about how could this happen., Further reading: The Hard-Partying, Rock-Obsessed Nurse at the Center of a Massive Opioid Bust. Purdue voice-over: Some patients may be afraid of taking opioids because theyre perceived as too strong or addictive but that is far from actual fact. [A moment of indistinct crosstalk.] Khazan: When I first started talking to Jeffs former patients, I thought I understood this story. He would sometimes brag about having sex on his lunch break, sharing with his staff pictures of his conquests, three employees said. About four years after its investigation began, the nursing board finally held a hearing to consider his fate. One admitted that Young had flirted with her. Young and Phillips, both longtime musicians, reveal that theyre working on some rap songs about Youngs haters, then ponder how to do gang signs. He has been arrested several times, though not convicted, for assaulting women. He invited a cameraman to document his life and eventually had it edited into a pilot for a reality-TV show. Natalia Ramirez: This episode of The Experiment was reported by Olga Khazan and produced by Alvin Melathe, with editing by Katherine Wells, Julia Longoria, and Denise Wills. A woman I spoke with who has worked for seven doctors offices in the area estimates that about three-quarters of medical visits there result in an opioid prescription. The biggest blow came in 2019, when Jeff was indicted by the federal government for overprescribing opioids, often in order to get, quote, money, notoriety, and sexual favors., In a court hearing, investigators described several Facebook messages between Jeff and his patients, identified only by their initials. Khazan: Thirty-one doctors and seven other nurse practitioners were busted in that same Justice Department sweep that caught Jeff. One employee recalled him sometimes being too drunk to see patients. There were reports of after-hours partiespossibly of Jeff having sex with his patients. Young seemed to have been expecting them. He was like a friend. Even when they do, the boards are mainly composed of doctors and nurses peers, who can be reluctant to throw the book at one of their own, says Rebecca Haw Allensworth, a Vanderbilt University law professor who has studied medical boards. Though the system came slowly for Young, during the years he was being investigated America underwent a national reckoning about opioids. The grosser side. Three, two, one. Looking for Jeff Young online? The pilot footagesome of which Young posted to YouTube, and some of which I obtained from a person who was once close to Youngportrays the Rock Doc as a medical bad boy whos willing to break free from the establishment to deliver real talk. The opioid epidemicwhich appears to only be getting worsehas made clear that wherever pain exists in America, grifters will follow. The week that followed Martin Luther King Jr.s assassination was revolutionaryso why was it nearly forgotten? In 2013, she was diagnosed with fibromyalgia, a chronic disorder that is usually accompanied by widespread pain and fatigue. And even then, I didnt want to hear it. One of his patients, Helena Louvaris, told me that Young saved her life by putting her on a diet plan. And that was not the case at all. Scott Deberry: And, you know, once you get around the tattoos and the way he talkscause he talks to you as if hes talking to you on the streets As long as he was going to take care of me and make me feel okay, or make me feel better, I had no problem with that. His vision was, evidently, to one day launch a reality series of the same name. The self-proclaimed "Rock Doc" is accused of trading powerful . How was a nurse practitioner whose behavior was so outrageous allowed to treat patients for so long? I dont like him asking out my daughter But even then, I still went to him, and my ex-husband still went to him. Young: Whats up, my friend? You can find Olgas written reporting on the Rock Doc at our website: http://www.theatlantic.com/experiment. Khazan: LaRhonda Scott Deberry is a 54-year-old former teacher who lives in Memphis. RockDocTV Show. ), Khazan: So doctors were kind of like, Okay.. When you got all kinds of money, said Jon Benjamin Sharp, a local musician who used to see Young around town, you got all kinds of friends. (Sharp made clear that he himself wasnt a fan of Youngs.) Scott Deberry: When I told him, I said, Every time I go to a doctor and tell them I feel like I have the flu, they look at me as if Im delusional.. With Young at least temporarily behind bars, some of his fans seem to have reached a point of disillusionment with the Rock Docor, at least, a point of fatigue. Khazan: And some of what she saw really weirded her out. Occupation (s) Guitarist. And the word that kept coming up when people described Jeff is comfortable. They thought I was basically lazy and just wanted to have pain pills, just for whatever reason. She told me that while she was a patient at the clinic, she had a front-row seat to Preventagenix getting more and more popular. Young: (Over the sound of a pool-filtration system.) In 2018, a woman told police that Young put his hands down her pants during an office visit, but that apparently led to nothing. Calles: Doctors judged me because of my weight. They didnt openly harass anyone who criticized them. Patients say the Rock Doc helped them like no one else could. He decked out PreventaGenix with psychedelic artwork and set the stereo to loud rock. Several others dismissed the notion that Young could be sexually coercive. Branding himself as the "Rock Doc," he flooded his social media accounts with images of a party-loving lifestyle, vitriol for his "haters" and even a pilot episode for a reality TV show . I asked to speak with him for this story, but because of a gag order on the case, his lawyer declined interviews with me. And hed stream from inside the clinic sometimes. And it was immediately clear that he is not your average medical provider. Rachel Fullington, an early employee of Youngs, told me Young wanted the clinics atmosphere to be loose and fun, while the others wanted it to be more buttoned-up. The story of how that doctor-patient communication broke downhundreds of thousands of timesis what Olga wanted to understand. Olga Khazan: At the time, there wasnt a lot of limits on pharmaceutical companies being able to tell doctors that. Over that time, his online following grew. Even after this, she returned to Young as a patient. But I was willing to overlook all that, you know? (Young has denied that hed had sex with the patient who appeared to be drugged.). Automated News Feed Subreddit No Censorship, Just News. Khazan: He had an account on Periscope, the live-streaming site. People who criticized Young swiftly became his enemies. Federal prosecutors say his help often amounted to dealing drugs for sex. Its often called the invisible illness, because, even though the pain is very real for the person experiencing it, some doctors dont take it seriously. Not that half of the, you know powers that be are on some sort of whatever. The former patient told me she became afraid to leave her house. And Jeff, sitting at the center of it, covered in tattooshe had a sort of unlikely charisma too. He didnt mind saying a curse word or two.. Dan Reaves, a local radio host on whose show Young occasionally appeared as part of a marketing plan, described Young as medically gifted. I told him about this podcastexplained to him what a podcast was. Prosecutors say Young used his rebellious persona to take advantage of patients, distributing highly addictive painkillers on demand and in large quantities for profitand, often, his own sexual gratification. Young was, in short, a medical provider who acted like everyones best friend. An obese man explains that Young helped him with his swollen leg. Jeffrey Young was one of those people. They dont want to touch you unless they have to touch you. 1986-present. Not all of them were into the whole edgy hard-rock thing at first. ), Jeff Young: Are we live? Young began arriving at the clinic smelling rancid, with greasy hair, and the clinics money problems mounted. As the cameraman who filmed the pilot told me, Everywhere he went, it was like the Beatles., But the way in which Young gained some of these fans has become the focus of a federal court case. Khazan: I started calling up former patients to try to understand the relationship Jeff had with them, and the appeal of this whole Rock Doc thing. As Young collected more tattoos and befriended more local bands, he began to attract a certain clientele. Every single time I went to that doctor and I left, Stairway to Heaven played. You may not like my rock and roll, you may not like my piercings, you may not like my sexy-ass beard, but you know what? Former employees speculated that he met the women in bars. Lax regulations played a role. (The case did not result in a conviction.) (Topix has since been shut down.) (The drugmaker that is most often blamed for the epidemic doesnt agree with this assessment: Suggesting that activities that last occurred more than 16 years ago are responsible for todays complex and multifaceted opioid crisis is deeply flawed, a Purdue Pharma spokesperson, Robert Josephson, said in a statement to The New York Times for a story on this issue.). (In response to a request for comment, a health-department spokesperson noted that, according to state law, the department cant suspend medical licenses without first giving practitioners the opportunity to demonstrate compliance regarding the allegations against them. In February 2016, he texted one of his opioid patients, a police officer named Jay Green. Thats okay. 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