Disciplined for distributing steroids | Vet says treatment to chuck wagon horses was proper
A Saskatchewan veterinarian who was disciplined for distributing anabolic steroids to chuck wagon horse owners says he will continue to fight what he feels is unfair treatment from the Saskatchewan Veterinary Medical Association.
Dr. Ed LaBrash, who operates LaBrash Veterinary Services in Meadow Lake, Sask., admitted to the charge during an SVMA discipline committee hearing in September.
Details of the case are outlined in the committee’s report acquired by The Western Producer. A summary of the report will be made public in an upcoming SVMA newsletter.
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As outlined in the document, the charge stems from an inspection of LaBrash’s practice in November 2009 by an SVMA-assigned inspector who identified deficiencies in LaBrash’s record keeping.
At the hearing, LaBrash admitted to failing to create proper medical records and dispensing narcotic and/or controlled substances without evidence of having first performed a physical examination of individual animals or groups of animals, which contravenes SVMA bylaws. The inspector had also noted other “minor deficiencies.”
LaBrash was ordered to pay a fine of $5,000, as well as the costs of the proceedings, totaling $30,000. The decision bans him from buying, administering, dispensing or selling anabolic steroids for three years.
“The clients have stood up behind me,” LaBrash said in an interview, referring to a subsequent community-driven petition and fundraiser.
“They’ve basically paid the legal fees and the fines up to this point.”
Area resident George Million is among his supporters.
“We like the work he does. That’s it in a nutshell for us,” said Million. “We want to keep him. We feel the vet board is trying to make it impossible for him to work.”
The report notes that at the hearing, “Dr. LaBrash’s lawyer indicated his client felt singled out unfairly, and that he did not receive full and sufficient disclosure.”
LaBrash said those issues, which he called a lack of transparency on the part of the SVMA, will motivate his future actions.
“There are follow-up challenges that are coming, that have been over the last couple of weeks and will be over the next few months regarding their conduct in this case,” he said in an interview.
LaBrash was previously reprimanded by the SVMA in 2002 for dispensing prescription drugs without the establishment of a valid veterinary client-patient relationship.
As a self-regulated profession, the SVMA has the authority to enforce its own bylaws under the Veterinarians Act of Saskatchewan.
The issue was heard by the SVMA’s discipline committee but prosecuted by its professional conduct committee.
The SVMA, Food and Drug Act and Regulations and Controlled Drugs and Substances Act all require written drug logs, medical records and evidence of a physical examination.
“LaBrash could only provide a list of chuck wagon clients to whom it appeared he was dispensing anabolic steroids and narcotics in large quantities without examination of the animals and with no written record,” said the report.
The report attributes Nicholas Stooshinoff, legal counsel for the SVMA’s professional conduct committee, as saying that these sales of anabolic steroids were for performance enhancement and not therapeutic purposes, which “had the potential for being a major societal concern.”
In his defence, as summarized in the report, LaBrash argued the substances were administered and not dispensed.
“Dr. LaBrash explained that he deals with a large number of chuck wagon clients and that it is common practice to use anabolic steroids for performance enhancement in their horses,” it reads.
“He sees these horses regularly by the trailer load because he performs hundreds of teeth floats and various other procedures every year. He felt that constituted a veterinary client-patient relationship. Dr. LaBrash was not of the mindset that such use of anabolic steroids was wrong.”
The report notes that, at a later inspection, “deficiencies found in the initial clinic inspection have been remedied.”
Still, as part of the penalty, LaBrash must submit to unannounced inspections of his clinic and submit to the SVMA all records pertaining to narcotic and controlled substances for three years.
“We’re not saying in this manner that when we take someone through discipline that they’re a bad person or that they are a criminal or whatever,” said SVMA registrar Sandra Stephens.
“What we’re saying is that what they did did not comply with the standards that we hold our members to and that not complying, we as a profession consider that there was potential for the public to be harmed.”
