Lawmakers consider licensing Las Vegas hangover treatments

LAS VEGAS — Medical businesses offering intravenous treatments to people with party-hard hangovers on the Las Vegas Strip could face regulation from local officials concerned about the chance of mistakes.

With about a dozen IV-therapy businesses now catering to dehydrated tourists, officials are drafting an ordinance to require providers to get a business license with Clark County Commission approval, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reports.

Commissioner Tick Segerblom cited the potential for spreading diseases such as hepatitis and called the focus on giving IV fluids to hungover tourists a disaster waiting to happen.

Dr. Jason Burke, a board-certified anesthesiologist who started the pioneering IV-therapy business Hangover Heaven in 2012, told commissioners that he’d like to see the industry regulated by licensing.

Commissioner Marilyn Kirkpatrick suggested it could be done through the Southern Nevada Health District.

Currently, a medical practitioner who violates state license regulations may be dismissed from the IV-therapy business, posing no lasting consequences for business owners, said Burke,

Medical personnel can run afoul of licensing boards by writing prescriptions for IV fluids without having contact with the patients they’re treating, he said.

Nevada State Board of Pharmacy executive David Wuest said the board has received between 10 and 20 complaints related to the IV-therapy businesses, and works with the state medical and nursing boards to investigate them.

Most complaints center on patients neither seeing nor teleconferencing with a doctor or other practitioner licensed to prescribe drugs before receiving treatment.

Wuest said the board substantiated a complaint against Dr. Raanan Pokroy of Reviv clinics, with three offices on the Las Vegas Strip. Raanan and his operation have since come into compliance.

As a patient, Wuest said, “You want the doctor to see you prior to getting the medication.”

Dr. Adam Nadelson, who is affiliated with the I.V. Doc clinic in Las Vegas, has been reprimanded in the state of Louisiana in connection with the administration of intravenous medications, the Review-Journal reported.

Neither Pokroy nor Nadelson returned calls from the newspaper.

Burke said most Hangover Heaven patients are treated in their hotel rooms.

They participate in a video conference with a doctor or nurse practitioner and provide a brief medical history including list of medications before they are prescribed an IV treatment.

Burke said a nurse takes the treatment to the patient.

Treatments might include vitamins and antioxidants and headache and nausea medication. A “Salvation” hangover cure costs $199 plus a $100 house-call fee.