St. Vincent doctor fined in connection with medical marijuana practice

Courtesy Photo A doctor at Saint Vincent Hospital in Worcester has been fined.

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By State House News Service

Massachusetts regulators have reprimanded and fined a doctor at Saint Vincent Hospital in Worcester in connection with his medical marijuana prescribing practices in Maine.

According to the Massachusetts Board of Registration in Medicine, Dr. William Ortiz agreed in a consent order that he had been disciplined in September 2014 by licensing officials in Maine "for having engaged in unprofessional conduct" stemming from his issuance of medical marijuana certificates to 59 patients over two days in Maine and for keeping incomplete records on those patients.

The Massachusetts Board of Registration in Medicine agreed on Thursday to reprimand Ortiz and fine him $2,500. A nocturnist at Saint Vincent Hospital, Ortiz has been licensed in Massachusetts since 1999 and the 1996 New York Medical College graduate is also licensed to practice medicine in Florida and Maine.

Maine licensing officials said that Ortiz, during meetings with patients over two days at the University Motor Inn and the Black Bear Inn in Orono, charged patients $200 each and issued them three-month medical marijuana certificates, but failed to create and maintain adequate medical records.

According to the case documents, Ortiz is certified to possess medical marijuana in Maine for his own use, and admitted to board staff that he applied a medical marijuana salve that he purchased in Maine with his certificate to one or more of his patients in Massachusetts.