A former Coastal Health Alliance doctor was fired from her post as the medical director for Marin Community Clinics after two separate D.U.I. arrests for pill possession and consumption that stripped her of her medical license in November.
Wendi Joiner, a 40-year-old Nicasio resident, was booked by California Highway Patrol in Sonoma County in late December 2014 after being spotted driving erratically, according to records from the state’s Medical Board.
Aside from blowing a blood-alcohol concentration of over twice the legal limit, Dr. Joiner was found with three handles of whiskey—one of which had been drunk down almost to the dregs.
She was also in possession of a whip cream dispenser charged with nitrous oxide, 24 nitrous oxide cartridges and over 100 pills, including Norco, Xanax, Fioricet and hydromorphone.
She pleaded no contest to six misdemeanor charges in April.
An ensuing investigation by the medical board uncovered alleged professional misconduct stemming from around 33 prescriptions Dr. Joiner signed for Xanax, Norco and Adderall to a fake name. Investigators traced that name to Dr. Joiner’s fiancé at the time.
Almost exactly a year after the first arrest, Dr. Joiner was booked in Marin County for possession of codeine, hydrocodone, amphetamine, carisoprodol, fentanyl and morphine. She was held on $10,000 bond and pleaded not guilty to four felony and two misdemeanor counts last month. A preliminary hearing is scheduled for early February.
The medical board has suspended her physician’s certificate on grounds that she “suffers from a mental or physical impairment that renders her unable to practice safely.”
Dr. Joiner provided infant, adult and emergency care at Coastal Health Alliance clinics from November 2012 to January 2015, when she left to helm the top post at the San Rafael-based Marin Community Clinics. Neither the executive director of Marin Community Clinics, Linda Tavaszi, nor the executive director of the Coastal Health Alliance, Steve Siegel, were aware of her arrest history. The health alliance’s former medical director, Mike Witte, said she came with good references.
“I do not believe that Dr. Joiner worked with us impaired at all,” Dr. Witte told the Light. “She was right on point. Her job performance was pretty impeccable, really.”
Following news of the dismissal, many of Dr. Joiner’s former patients took to social media to express shock and sadness. Several praised her for providing good care and said they had no reason to suspect that she may have been taking pills on the job. “She seemed like a smart, pro-active physician willing to listen and help,” said Elizabeth Barnet, of Inverness.
Others recall Dr. Joiner’s care in a less positive light. When Marshall resident Emery Calo Vest’s father, James Vest, was feeling back pain in late 2012, he was prescribed Vicodin, Percocet and muscle relaxants, then sent home. Mr. Vest died months later from a melanoma tumor wrapped around his spine. Ms. Vest feels her father could have avoided a world of pain had Dr. Joiner been more careful and discerning about the diagnosis.
“She never sent him to get an M.R.I. or a second opinion,” she said. “I don’t know what would have happened, but I feel that she was negligent with his care. I think it’s unconscionable to take care of someone when you have a drinking and drug problem.”
For his part, Dr. Witte lamented the suffering of peers caught in the throes of alcohol and drug dependence, whom he said have had less recourse since funds for substance-abuse help ran out during the 2008 recession. “I’ve seen them in the past: doctors that really need help,” he said. “When you’re impaired, you need to have some sort of recourse. And it’s endemic in the world that we live in, not just in health care.”