Helen Malmgren has written another article on Usana Health Sciences.
The article says that Mr. Ladd MacNamara (not Dr.) sent NBR a letter regarding their reporting of his Usana situation:
The article stated that Mr McNamara resigned from Usana’s medical advisory board after it was revealed that he was “falsely claiming to have a medical license after it had been revoked in two states.”
In his letter to NBR, Mr McNamara admits that his two state medical licenses were revoked but writes that one of them was valid “the entire time I served on Usana’s medical advisory board.”
NBR asked Usana about the timing of Mr McNamara’s resignation from its medical advisory board. The company declined to comment.
In his letter to NBR, Mr McNamara also writes “I NEVER falsely claimed to have a medical license!”
Hmmm…. didn’t he resign from the medical advisory board AFTER Barry Minkow revealed his license had been revoked in two states? Didn’t he falsely refer to himself as Dr. Ladd McNamara and/or Ladd McNamara, M.D. up until the time when Barry revealed he had no medical license?
NBR reports additional information about Ladd’s licenses in Georgia and Ohio:
But the State Medical Board of Ohio charged Mr McNamara with making “false, fraudulent, deceptive or misleading statements in relation to the practice of medicine or in securing a certificate to practice” when it revoked his license in May, according to Joan Wehrle, executive staff coordinator of the board.
Ms Wehrle said Mr McNamara was required to tell the Ohio medical board that he had surrendered his license in Georgia when he renewed his license in Ohio in 2006. Instead, Ohio learned that information elsewhere.
Mr McNamara also states that he surrendered his Georgia medical license “for a minor offense,” which Usana spokesman Joe Poulos has earlier described as “prescribing medication to a family member.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t exactly buy that one,” said Dr Jim McNatt, medical director at the Georgia State Board of Medical Examiners. Dr McNatt said the medical board could not publicly release the charge against Ladd McNamara but “it would have to be more than that,” especially since Georgia doesn’t even have a prohibition on doctors prescribing medication to family members.
Ladd apparently thinks he can call himself a doctor no matter what:
Finally, Mr McNamara wrote that he “will always be a doctor, whether licensed or not.”
But according to Candis Cohen of the State Medical Board of California, where Mr McNamara currently lives, “He is so wrong…As long as he’s living here he can’t call himself ‘MD’ or ‘doctor’ or ‘physician’ unless he has a California medical license.”
Ms Cohen referred to section 2054 of California’s business and professions code, which Mr McNamara appears to have violated when he advertised himself as a “board-certified medical doctor” in flyers for a number of Usana speaking engagements in California in July.
I guess Ladd’s time with Usana has taught him a thing or two about trying to justify illegal behavior.
