PORTLAND, Ore. (RNS) A psychiatrist who the state has reprimanded for wrongly prescribing drugs says he plans to open a facility in Portland and charge fees to help patients end their lives under Oregon’s Death with Dignity Act.
Stuart G. Weisberg has mailed invitations to local doctors and politicians inviting them to a July 21 “presentation” at a restaurant to unveil his new business, End of Life Consultants LLC.
Weisberg did not return calls Wednesday (June 23) seeking more information on his venture, which apparently would be the first of its kind in the nation. Weisberg filed incorporation papers with the state June 2.
In the invitation to the July 21 dinner, Weisberg said he has invited Jack Kevorkian, the Michigan pathologist who provided the drugs and the means for terminally ill people to kill themselves and served a prison sentence for his actions.
On the website for End of Life Consultants, Weisberg said he has obtained a Portland property that he calls “The Dignity House” where his patients under the Death With Dignity law can receive the medicine and die there. The website promises an address and photos next month.
Officials at nonprofit organizations that work with patients under Oregon’s assisted-suicide law expressed surprise at the little information they could glean about Weisberg’s proposal. The doctor has not spoken with anyone at the Death With Dignity National Center or Compassion & Choices of Oregon. Last year, doctors helped 59 people to die in Oregon under the law.
Weisberg, 37, is a solo practitioner with an office in Northwest Portland. In 2006, the Oregon Medical Board disciplined him for improperly prescribing psychoactive drugs to seven patients who were recovering drug addicts or dealing with chronic pain.
The board’s order said Weisberg, who earned his medical degree at the Medical College of Wisconsin in 2000, was terminated from his four-year residency at OHSU several months before he was to finish. No explanation was given.
On July 9, 2009, the board ended Weisberg’s probation a year early and put him instead under the wing of an unnamed “practice mentor,” another doctor who was to meet twice a month with Weisberg and file quarterly reports with the board.