Since the start of the new year, Governor Abbott has appointed six new members to the Texas Medical Board. The new members, whose terms are set to expire in April 2021, include five physicians and one public member. One of the new appointees, Sherif Zaafran, M.D., has also been named the Board’s new president. Dr. Zaafran, an anesthesiologist, takes over from Michael Arambula, M.D., Pharm.D., who has severed as the Board’s president for the last several years.
With such a sizable influx of new members and the appointment of a new Board president, it will be interesting to see whether there are any shifts in Board policy or disciplinary priorities. Some of the Medical Board’s most prominent initiatives over the last several years have been its ongoing legal battle over telemedicine, the regulation of medspas and non-surgical cosmetic procedures, and the continued crackdown on what the Board views as the non-therapeutic prescribing of pain medications. Whether these will continue to be a primary focus waits to be seen.
On a more individual level, the new Board members have been regularly appearing at informal settlement conferences. Our firm’s experience with the new appointees has been largely positive in this respect as the new members have been generally receptive to the responding physician’s arguments and attentive to the details of each case even if they do not always reach the decision we are advocating for on behalf of our clients. I am hopeful this trend continues.
As of the date of this post, the Board is also still searching for a new Executive Director. The prior Executive Director, Mari Robinson, had a lengthy tenure with the Board and always appeared to play a strong role in the development and implementation of Board policy. Since Ms. Robinson’s departure last year, the Board’s General Counsel, Scott Freshour, has served as the Interim Executive Director. I anticipate any changes in the Board’s broader policies will begin to take shape once they have selected Ms. Robinson’s permanent successor.