A pioneer of addiction treatment

LIMA — Dr. Robert Wheeler often worked late, worried that closing the office too early would dissuade a patient who finally decided to start suboxone from coming to see him when clinic opened the next day.

He gave patients his cell phone number and came into clinic on Fridays — what should have been his day off.

Children were always welcome.

Wheeler’s mantra: “treatment over punishment, compassion over condemnation and empathy over placing blame.”

The Mental Health and Recovery Services Board of Allen, Auglaize and Hardin Counties dedicated its Overdose Awareness Day rally Thursday to Wheeler, who died in December 2022.

The late physician is remembered by former colleagues as a pioneer in addiction treatment in Allen County for changing perceptions surrounding suboxone, a medication to treat opioid addiction.

Suboxone uses a combination of buprenorphine, a partial opiate, and naloxone to satiate opiate cravings by tricking the brain into believing it’s getting more opioids than it is and blocking the high caused by them.

Few physicians in Lima prescribed suboxone when Wheeler, an internal medicine physician for Mercy Health-St. Rita’s Medical Center, started prescribing the medication, inspired by his daughter Jenna’s recovery from heroin use.

“There was always a little bit of a stigma about it,” said Emily Paxson, a registered nurse who worked for Wheeler’s clinic. “He was able to talk to (physicians) and help them understand where (patients) are coming from.”

Paxson followed Wheeler, having worked closely with the doctor at St. Rita’s to treat drug and alcohol patients in withdrawal, when Wheeler opened his suboxone clinic in 2018.

Federal restrictions on suboxone at the time meant Wheeler needed to obtain a waiver to prescribe the medication, which would limit him to 30 active patients in his first year.

Wheeler applied for the waiver soon after his daughter successfully completed a suboxone program.

“He saw what Lima had and said, ‘this isn’t working,’” Jenna Wheeler recalled.

“It was not an easy path to take,” said Wheeler’s son, Kevin. “That just shows how meaningful it was to him.”

Physicians who prescribed suboxone in its early days typically enacted strict rules, like mandatory group therapy or daily visits to the clinic so nurses could supervise patients while they took their suboxone amid fears the clinics would become “pill mills,” said Jake Stabler, a social worker who worked for Wheeler’s clinic.

Wheeler took a different approach, making sure his clinic was accessible so patients wouldn’t quit due to a lack of childcare or incompatible work schedules.

Patients who relapsed often came back to Wheeler for a second chance.

“He always took them back because he’d say, ‘I wouldn’t want my daughter out there with no help,’” said Courtney Bechdolt, a licensed practical nurse, adding: “He was the most compassionate doctor I’ve ever worked for.”

Jenna got her own second chance with her father when she became sober in 2015. Wheeler founded a frozen yogurt store in Findlay, the Sweet Frog, which Jenna now manages.

She’ll be nine years sober in December, a bittersweet milestone coinciding with the two-year anniversary of her father’s death. “I’m just grateful that we were able to get back on great terms and have that chance to repair our relationship,” Jenna said.