After a week of allegations that he fondled patients in his care years ago, Dr. Melvin Levine quit practicing pediatrics Friday by pulling his medical license from active status.
Levine, 68, had been the director of the Clinical Center for the Study of Development and Learning at UNC-Chapel Hill. He retired from full-time work in 2006 but continued to see patients twice a month.
University officials said this week that he had voluntarily decided to stop seeing patients as a result of the lawsuits against him claiming sexual misconduct.
Levine's attorney in Raleigh, Alan Schneider, said the doctor "adamantly denies that he has ever been abusive in any way to any patient." He said Levine's decision Friday to pull his medical license should not be construed as admitting guilt.
"His voluntary transfer to inactive status is in no way an acknowledgement of wrongdoing or improper conduct," Schneider said.
"He looks forward to the opportunity to discuss this" with the N.C. Medical Board, which licenses and disciplines doctors, said Schneider, who is representing Levine in the context of a potential medical board investigation. He added that Levine is eager to detail "the manner in which he has evaluated, examined and treated children in 40 years of helping patients and their families."
By taking his medical license out of active status, Levine effectively quit practicing. Doctors must have an active license to treat, diagnose or operate on patients.
But the move is different from surrendering a license, because it will not trigger a report to the National Practitioner Data Bank -- an electronic network that all medical licensing agencies and malpractice insurers can access to monitor actions against doctors.
Still, the move would not ward off an investigation by the medical board. Thomas Mansfield, director of the board's legal department, said he is barred by law from discussing investigations of individual doctors. But he said the board has jurisdiction over all doctors, even those whose licenses are inactive.
"It happens pretty often that we investigate someone who is inactive," Mansfield said, adding that serious complaints often take precedence over others. "The more serious it is, the more serious it gets fast-tracked."
Levine, who is an author of childhood development books and has appeared on "The Oprah Winfrey Show," has been sued by five former patients in Boston, where he practiced before moving to Chapel Hill in the mid-1980s.
The former patients allege that when they were young boys under Levine's treatment, he groped them during examinations. The lawsuits became public this week when the lawyer handling the cases held a news conference, asking other patients with similar experiences to come forward.
More complaints
Since then, at least 20 people have contacted Carmen L. Durso, the Boston lawyer, and Elizabeth Kuniholm, who practices law in North Carolina. About half of those patients are from North Carolina, Durso said Friday.
"This is not over," Durso said, noting that the allegations against Levine stand, even though he has quit practicing medicine. "I hope people who are coming forward to talk to the medical board or law enforcement won't say now it's over. He is still denying he did anything wrong to those people."
Durso said many patients may still be mulling whether to call and could have suffered psychological harm. He called for investigations by the medical board, law enforcement agencies and the institutions where Levine practiced, including UNC Healthcare in Chapel Hill and Children's Hospital in Boston.
Karen McCall, vice president of public affairs at UNC Healthcare, said the hospital has not heard from any patients with complaints about Levine but would "absolutely" begin an inquiry based on a patient's concerns or allegations.
"Any kind of inquiries we get from patients always are investigated," McCall said. "And then appropriate steps are taken, based on the investigation."
