As a visitor to my website, you did not come here by accident. I have been widely publicized in the media and on the internet for the past three years.
In 2005 I worked for an online pharmacy and provided prescriptions via the internet for people who came to the website and made such requests. I limited myself to refilling prescriptions that patients said they had already been taking. The most common prescriptions were for Viagra and similar drugs, a non-narcotic pain reliever named Tramadol, and occasional antidepressants. I believed I was providing a service to those individuals who could not afford a doctor's visit and the prescription as well.
In 2006 the California Board of Medicine charged me with practicing medicine in California without a California medical license. The case was sensationalized in the media because a young man who received a prescription of an antidepressant from me in 2005 committed suicide two months later. Fortunately, all medical testimony from both sides of the case and a US District Court judge agreed the antidepressant played no role in his suicide.
In 2007 the California Court of Appeals ruled that if a physician from another state prescribes for a patient in California via the internet and does not have a California medical license, that physician is guilty of practicing medicine in California without a California license and has committed a felony. My case was the first such case to be prosecuted in the English speaking world. I pleaded no contest to that charge.
But my life and career are not over yet. I still want to make a difference to the millions of the uninsured and depressed Americans who cannot afford a doctor's visit to obtain a prescription to treat their depression. Right now depressed people still turn to the internet for antidepressant drugs. But they are likely to get drugs manufactured in a foreign country with no review by any medical professional. The need and demand for such prescriptions does not disappear simply by outlawing it in the United States.
Hence I have founded Depression Care Access, Inc, a nonprofit 501 (c) 3 corporation which will provide financial assistance to uninsured and underinsured people who feel they are suffering from depression. The financial assistance will be for two visits to the doctor of their choosing in their own community. This is my way of making the internet work for the uninsured depressed without violating any state law.