CBS Local — An 84-year-old doctor has lost her license to practice medicine, partly because she does not own or know how to use a computer.
New Hampshire physician Anna Konopka surrendered her license in October after the state’s Board of Medicine found problems with her record keeping, prescriptions to patients, and decision making. On Nov. 15 a local judge reportedly denied Konopka’s appeal to regain her license after the doctor claimed she was forced to hand it over.
“I’m not upset about anything. The legal system is a game. You move. They move. It’s full of tricks and different movements,” the doctor said, via CBS News. “I am fighting. Therefore as long as I am fighting, I have some hope,” Konopka added.
Merrimack Superior Court Judge John Kissinger says the 84-year-old failed to show any evidence that she was forced to surrender her license. The allegations against go beyond the elderly physician’s inability to use a computer. New Hampshire’s medical board began the investigation of Konopka’s practice after five complaints from patients questioned her decisions regarding their treatment. Before any discipline could be handed down by the board, Konopka allegedly handed over her license to state officials.
The doctor’s small practice in New London, which has a population of just 4,400, has gained a large local following from patients who prefer the 84-year-old’s simplistic and personal touch. “The doctor I had before was over-medicating me, and she gives me a lot of herbal stuff and I was doing a lot better. Now, I’m back to being screwed. I don’t know what to do,” Stanley Wright, who saw Dr. Konopka for chronic back pain said, via The Grand Island Independent.
The doctor’s critics have also taken aim at her record-keeping system, which consists of just two filing cabinets and a landline telephone.
“The problem now is that I am not doing certain things on computer. I have to learn that. It is time consuming. I have no time,” the doctor proclaimed. State officials alleged the Konopka’s lack of computer skills put her patients at risk of prescription mistakes that could lead to overdoses.
The former doctor’s loyal patients fought back against those claims as well.
“My old doctors, they had their heads shoved into their computers. It was never personal with you. They never even looked at you,” Jill Beaudry said, via CBS4. “With her, she’s 100% focused, and I hate when the doctors are using computers like that, because that’s not medicine.”
Dozens of Konopka’s patients have already written Judge Kissinger in hopes of convincing him to reverse the decision against the 84-year-old.