Recent news articles (TNT, 11-2) have accurately reported that, due to action taken by the Washington Legislature in 2005, naturopaths in our state can now prescribe anything short of oxycontin and methadone.

They may prescribe intravenous medications and even codeine, as long as they obtain a license from the federal Drug Enforcement Administration.

Has anyone caught the irony of giving this new prescriptive authority to people who have staked their profession on discounting the germ theory of disease?

I am disturbed by this new law and its impact on the care provided to patients in this state. Allowing health care providers who have not undergone the extensive and necessary education and training to prescribe powerful and potentially dangerous medications to patients is a serious concern to me and the Washington State Medical Association.

No doubt some patients see value in using naturopathic services, and I am not disparaging the services naturopaths provide. In fact, some physicians work in collaboration with naturopaths.

But naturopathy is a different field of study that is not the educational equivalent of a multiyear residency program that physicians and surgeons must complete.

Consumers should keep in mind that alternative remedies are not regulated by the Federal Drug Administration. We do not know all the side effects of alternative medicines, and in many cases we don’t know how they interact with other medications.

I understand we have a free market system, and consumers should be free to purchase services from whomever best meets their needs, fits their vision and agrees with their values.

However, legislatively expanding the scope of practice to providers who are truly not physicians and surgeons has gotten out of hand. Washington’s new law is the latest in a long line of proposed or actual scope-of-practice expansions that may make political sense but do not make scientific sense.

If naturopaths or any other health care providers want to provide the same services as physicians, such as prescribing drugs, they should go to medical school. Otherwise, what’s the point of having medical schools in the first place?

This latest law is an excellent reminder that caveat emptor (let the buyer beware) is very good advice indeed in today’s world of increasingly blurred health care choices.

Dr. Brian P. Wicks, an orthopedic surgeon in Bremerton, is president of the Washington State Medical Association.