Board denies local doctor’s request to reinstate license – News – The Dispatch

Last week, the North Carolina Medical Board denied a Lexington doctor’s application to have his medical license reinstated.

Dr. James Randall Long received the denial on April 16. In response, Long’s defense attorney Alan Schneider requested a hearing on the denial, stating that Long has the proper qualifications for his license to be reinstated. The board will notify Long about the time and place of the hearing sometime in the next few weeks.

In October 2016, Long pleaded guilty to distribution and possession with intent to distribute fentanyl by an authorized registrant outside the scope of professional practice and not for a legitimate medical purpose. He gave fentanyl to a woman with whom he was romantically involved, knowing that she was using the drugs to further her opioid addiction. He surrendered his medical license in December 2016.

Long admitted that shortly after meeting the woman in 2014 and until July 2015, he provided her prescriptions for fentanyl. He also revealed that during that time, he wrote and authorized fentanyl prescriptions in the woman’s name and in the name of several other individuals, some of whom were not patients of Long and did not know prescriptions were being filled in their name.

He was sentenced in March 2017 to one year and one day in federal prison.

It was also discovered that while Long was under federal indictment in October 2016, he opened medical practices in Murphy and Greensboro. He continued to operate the office in Murphy by placing another doctor in the practice after surrendering his license.

His misdeeds date back to 2004 when he was disciplined for prescribing painkillers to a woman with whom he was having an affair. Long’s license was suspended for a year, but it was stayed for 30 days.

In 1998, Long began a doctor-patient relationship with the woman, which became sexual in nature. During that time, Long wrote her numerous prescriptions for controlled substances and he failed to document most of them. The woman was fired in June 2003 from her nursing job at Lexington Memorial Hospital , now Wake Forest Baptist – Lexington Medical Center, after being accused in a hospital investigation of stealing drugs for personal use and when she tested positive for opiates.

Long also pleaded guilty in 2008 to a federal misdemeanor charge of intercepting radio communication that was encrypted to Dish Network satellite television signals, but the conviction did not affect his licensure. He was instead placed on probation for a year.

Long, a 1986 graduate of the UNC-Chapel Hill, was issued a license to practice medicine and surgery by the N.C. Medical Board in 1989. He served as Lexington Memorial chief of staff from 2000 to 2002.

Ben Coley can be reached at (336) 249-3981, ext. 227 or at ben.coley@the-dispatch.com. Follow Ben on Twitter: @LexDispatchBC