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In their friendly discussion with Friesen, Committee members stressed that they had worked closely with him to refine  the bill's provisions on stem-cell research and "transitioning" to clinical applications.  But even though they are charged with overseeing state licensing boards, no Committee members expressed concern about Friesen's status as an unlicensed pharmacist.  Nor did anyone mention that the legislature had yet to hear from a single person with any qualifications related either to institutional review boards or to medical research.  Silence likewise prevailed in regard to ongoing investigations by the Attorney General's Office of Royal and Friesen's violations of state and federal law during and after their tenure on the NIRB.  Committee member Warren B. Hardy, Jr. also stayed mum about the fact that his father, W. Brent Hardy, Sr. had served on the Homeopathic Board and tried to block Dan Royal's ouster as President.  But perhaps the greatest testament to the Committee's capacity for sham was that everyone present pretended not to know that Royal and Friesen had already been forced to severe ties with the NIRB and that their only remaining connection with the scheme was that they had originally crafted it as a business venture in 2005. 

Despite the unanimous approval of the Commerce and Labor Committee, the fate of both the NIRB and the stem-cell bill remained uncertain during the final weeks of the 2007 legislative session.   Then, late on June 3, the day before the session ended, under the guise of a bill that would have eliminated the NIRB in July 2007, the legislature extended its existence for two more years.  Having replaced all references to "2007" with "2009," lawmakers added the last minute stipulation that the NIRB is authorized to "contract with a private company to conduct studies or other work related to non-embryonic stem cells in bioregenerative stem cell technology" so long as the "Legislative Commission determines that it is in the best interests of this State" (p.387).   

Since this bill orders a "study" of issues related to alternative medicine to be carried out by the Nevada Legislative Counsel Bureau (LCB), some people might conclude that the homeopaths' activities could finally be subjected to meaningful review (a word that was actually crossed out in the amended bill).  These hopes must be tempered by an understanding of the past relationship between the LCB and the homeopaths.  Historically, the Homeopathic Board has relied on the LCB to legitimize regulations that violate accepted medical standards and undermine the allopathic Medical Board's mandate to supervise its own licensees.  Moreover, in reviewing the regulations formulated when the NIRB was first created, the LCB apparently missed the fact that no one involved had any expertise related to the protection of human subjects or any other aspect of medical research.  And when Dean Friesen, who had been forced to resign as NIRB President after Nancy Lucas filed a restraining order against him, was somehow exonerated by the Attorney General's Office, Friesen specifically "thanked the LCB (Legislative Counsel Bureau) for its help" (3/10/06).   Finally, when both the Homeopathic Board and the NIRB were collapsing amid their members' altercations, Senator Schneider offered to pull the plan out of the fire "with help from legal counsel at the LCB" (3/28/06). 

Anyone who imagines that sheer stupidity might put in a crimp in these undertakings should keep in mind that this is Nevada, where idiocy is no obstacle to progress.  In the final bill, for instance, legislators made a point of keeping the NIRB Medical Foundation, a 501(c)(3) that Dan Royal had illegally created to avoid state audits, in place even though its only trustees, Dan Royal, Dean Friesen, and unlicensed accountant Robert Gentry, no longer had any connection with the NIRB.  Legislators likewise ignored Dan Royal's misconduct during and after his troubled term as President of the Homeopathic Board, which included not only using his position to advance his business interests and other failures of judgment, but also fraudulently obtaining confidential information about other homeopaths from the Attorney General's Office in an apparent effort to find some grounds to sue fellow board members.  And as if all of this evidence of incompetence were insufficient, Senator Schneider assured the public on June 30, 2007 that research into the safety and efficacy of stem-cell therapy would be conducted, not by medical experts, but by government employees:  

Under the new law, legislative staffers will report on how placing stem cells in individuals might cure currently incurable diseases. The measure’s sponsor, Sen. Mike Schneider, D-Las Vegas, said the research could establish Nevada as a national leader in the field. “It would be great for medical tourism from all over the world,” Schneider said.

 In light of the elastic language inserted into the final bill, it would not be surprising if we soon hear Dan Royal argue that his business associate, David Steenblock, or someone else at New Hope Medical is now perfectly free to offer stem-cell therapy in Nevada.  Indeed, since medical research and treatment can be carried on there by practitioners who would not be regarded as qualified anywhere else in the country, since state officials have yet to show any interest in the ethical purpose of IRB's, since no one on the Medical Board seems concerned about the integrity of health care, and since federal officials already have their hands full dealing with crooked Nevada physicians, it would be hard to stop anyone from conducting stem-cell studies and/or clinical applications in any setting within state lines now that this bill has passed.  As remarkable as it seems,  the Nevadans' dream of medical tourism may already be a reality now that state-sponsored charlatans are free to lure in the desperate, the ill, and the dying to serve as guinea pigs for unregulated and anti-scientific stem-cell experiments.

Update 1/30/08  -  The bickering among the homeopaths has continued, but Senator Michael Schneider has reportedly already obtained an opinion from the Legislative Counsel Bureau on the legality of the NIRB and the activities of his friend and personal physician, Dan Royal.  Schneider has, however, refused to make this opinion public so we don't know if the NIRB has already contracted with a private company to undertake stem-cell studies. It is important to note that the homeopaths have historically rejected preliminary research in favor of clinical applications so whatever "work" they may be engaged in would almost certainly involve human subjects.  Moreover, Dan Royal began to advertise "stem-cell research" as one of the services offered at New Hope Medical long before Schneider introduced legislation that would authorize him to conduct this research.

In an additional effort to keep this scheme alive, Senator Schneider apparently met with Nevada Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto in October 2007 to convince her to protect Dan Royal from a complaint filed against him by other members of the Homeopathic Board.  While the Board's complaint, which alleges that Royal allowed his business partner, unlicensed pharmacist Dean Friesen, to misrepresent himself as a doctor in treating patients at New Hope Medical, has yet to be resolved, Royal has responded that the Homeopathic Board has no jurisdiction over his practice because he operates solely as an osteopath, and not as a homeopath, despite his ongoing membership on the Homeopathic Board.  From Royal's perspective, this familiar strategy makes sense because the Nevada State Board of Osteopathic Medical Examiners is even more dysfunctional than the Medical Board and the Homeopathic Board.  For confirmation of the Osteopathic Board's glaring incompetence, just visit its error-ridden web site, where it boldly asserts that its mission is "to protect and safeguard the public by licensing and disciplining well-educated and competent Doctors of Osteopathy and Physician Assistants." (If you can't detect what is illogical in that statement, you've spent too much time in Nevada.)

When it comes to dealing with questionable healthcare, some media outlets in Nevada have been as irresponsible as state officials in misleading the public.  Going far beyond the PR piece on the NIRB published by the Review-Journal in 2005, KTNV ABC News created a full-page ad for Dan Royal's New Hope Medical Clinic that was featured on the Health Connections section of its web site for months during 2007.  The multimedia ad was not only mixed indiscriminately with news, but also included an infomercial full of misleading materials that was produced by the station itself and presented under its logo.

 Highlights of the KTNV ABC video include a conversation with New Hope Medical Director Dean Friesen, whose white coat and comments on focusing on the "art" rather than the "science" of medicine make it hard to tell that he is an unlicensed pharmacist rather than a physician.  It is likewise disconcerting to hear Dan Royal  stress that he goes beyond merely infusing patients with FDA-disapproved and non-homeopathic doses of human growth hormone, but also strives to discover other ways to administer drugs that would not be prescribed by conventional physicians.  Finally, while the stem cell research that is apparently being carried on at New Hope Medical isn't mentioned in the infomercial, it was prominently featured on a sidebar on the Health Connections web page.  What isn't clear is exactly who is conducting this research since the ad fails to identify anyone at New Hope Medical who is qualified or authorized to pursue stem-cell studies. 

"Complimentary Medicine" = "You look great!"