Canna Care Docs

My Time at Canna Care Docs

Prior to officially opening Nature’s Way Medicine®, I spoke with a gentleman who was cofounder of Canna Care Docs for at least two hours. This was mid August 2015, and I was already registering and planning my own clinic at the time. I proposed that I work for Canna Care Docs’ Delaware clinic in the meantime to provide help since they had no doctor and to later mutually assume a collegial relationship as medical marijuana clinics. This man used a different name for his email address, John Smith was the name attached to his email that contained LarryDavid1989 but his real name was Larry Einhorn… a red flag… He was very happy to have me on board. The only info I can find about him is from this article exposing their shady practices in 2014, stating him as co-owner along with Michael Maloney, their chief legal representative who later harassed me with letters threatening to sue me. Even his personal profile describes himself as “aggressive” (twice) and a “fierce litigator.”

The COO of Canna Care Docs, Marta Downing, wanted me to start immediately. The following week, I started on verbal promises with the expectation that everything was clear about my conflicting interest in my own clinic. Their desperation for a doctor was evident to the point that they had me working prior to signing a contract, and they hadn’t even arranged malpractice insurance for me. Which was not told to me until I asked during the job.

The facility

That Delaware Canna Care Docs clinic is located at 9 Germay drive, Wilmington Delaware. It’s right across the street from a car wash that was busted for heroin large-scale distribution. As we know, the opioid epidemic and the prevalence of heroin use in the public is at a level never seen before. This road is like the red light district of Wilmington, hosting it’s compassion center, the only distributor in the state that is also now trying to secured the other two distributor licenses for itself and is owned by a retired state trooper ironically. Across from that is a vape and smoke shop.

The Canna Care building had a banner hanging over it made of cheap plastic that said the clinic’s name, and its logo. The facility was shared with an EMS company. Inside, it smelled of damp mildew. The room assigned to me had a desk and a patient examination table. As I saw patients I couldn’t help but think about that table because it looked like an antique relic. Finally, it dawned on me what it was. It was an antique autopsy table for embalming bodies. That made me super uncomfortable.

Empty promises

The staff there were very friendly, because the office manager was on leave for half the time I was there. Maggie Berg Fauver, is also a board member of the nonprofit organization Delaware  NORML.  it was obvious from the moment she arrived that she was not interested in medical care but rather a factories assembly line of patient approval followed by my quick talk and signing of the Delaware medical marijuana application. I was told that I took too long speaking with patients, despite only talking for 5 to 10 minutes. It was especially unnerving how awkward and disappointed this staff was when I declined the patient who was not a candidate for medical marijuana and especially at risk of psychological side effects if started on the therapy.  It was like there were no patients that should be disapproved even under my judgment and experience as a board-certified physician.

Mind you, at this point I was still on a verbal working agreement.  The way I saw it, this was just a sign of my dedication to them. And I made it very clear to the co-owner that I was willing to give them the chance of hiring me if I were to receive some sort of partnership, and then I would drop my plans for my own clinic.  Since nothing was signed, on my second shift I was told that I was only going to get paid for new patients, not follow-ups. Later the compensation was to receive was decreased.

  Unethical Expectations

On my fourth shift there, I was already having doubts in my mind about being there and my career path in general. The straw that broke the camel’s back was when I was handed a stack of patient charts, probably between 50 and 100, which had been approved for medical marijuana by Canna Care’s prior cardiologist, who I have not been able to reach. My understanding is that he was fired for not complying with their requests.

Now these stacks needed my signature, which was to be on verification forms stating that it was I who signed the initial application approval, and that I had had a bona fide relationship with these patients. But I never even met or spoke to any of them. What they were asking me to do was to sign something that was false. This would be illegal. Worse, I realized those patients were not being verified (the second step of the process to get the card approved) AND they were not being told that there was no doctor at all prior to my arriving there.

By now I had learned to be politically correct in the office place so I did not decline to sign the charts but instead asked about my malpractice insurance. The company was now obviously the type of operation that would leave a doctor uninsured without knowing. My instincts were confirmed and I was told that I was indeed still uninsured. Despite having already been practicing medicine. But before starting I was told that I WAS insured and in my opinion that unethical and possibly illegal how they treated me.

So I walked out, sometime around lunchtime.

That’s when I got a call from President, Kevin Kafka.  He asked me to finish the day, told me I would receive a new contract that would be impossible to say no to. I spent a long time preparing for that negotiation and unfortunately after I started it by asking what his values and goals were, I was never really given any time to speak myself. What really concerned me was this guy’s attitude and who he was as a person. He’s a ghost online; I can’t seem to find him anywhere. The way he spoke to me was like a fraternity brother, manic with greed and a mission to monopolize medical clinics for marijuana. He boasted his successes and I agreed to return the next morning after he promised to send me the new contract that evening.

Needless to say, the contract was a joke, an insult. In bold writing, all that was added was something along the lines of, “if all goes well you will be made director of X,X,and X states.” I didn’t go to work the next day to sign those stacks of charts. And the contract didn’t arrive in my inbox until after 11 AM the following day.

Stay Tuned

Stay tuned for the next part of this story and why I think it’s important given the recent events surrounding Canna Care Docs and the suspension of their physicians’ licenses.

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