The board that governs the Texas Physician Health Program will meet Nov. 13 in Austin and take up drug and alcohol testing options for the doctors it monitors — an item that has sat on its agenda since early 2024 without producing a recommendation.
The program is the state’s confidential alternative to discipline for licensees whose health could affect their practice. Created by the Legislature in 2009 and attached to the Texas Medical Board, it monitors physicians, physician assistants and, since a law that took effect last year, anyone else the medical board licenses. Records are privileged and shielded from subpoena while a participant complies. The statute requires the program to run relapse monitoring that includes random drug testing, so what the testing costs and who performs it is not a side question.
The trail on the item is thin. A testing vendor demonstrated a product to the board in May 2024; the minutes record no price and no follow-up, and the Dispatch found no contract. The same item has reappeared at every meeting since. Nothing matching it had reached the medical board’s disciplinary review committee, where any recommendation would go, as of that committee’s August agenda. The program has posted no minutes since 2024 and had not posted this meeting at all as of Nov. 6, so what the board discussed at its September meeting cannot be checked against a public record. The agenda used for this preview is the one the program filed with the Secretary of State.
Scale is likewise hard to pin down. The last enrollment figure the program published was 281 participants, reported at its May 2024 meeting for the second quarter of that fiscal year. The board will hear a current number Nov. 13, along with a quarterly report on positive drug tests. A required internal audit of the program’s intake, monitoring, confidentiality and case-closing practices was pushed from 2025 into the fiscal year that ended in August; the Dispatch found no completed report.
One of the eleven seats has been vacant since 2025. The medical board’s president, not the governor, appoints to this board and fills its vacancies.
Meeting at a glance
- When
- 9:00 AM, Friday, November 13, 2026. TRD 2026006613 was filed November 5 at 3:53 p.m. The board last met September 25.
- Where
- 1801 Congress Ave., Suite 9.900, Austin, with members joining by videoconference. The presiding officer will attend in person.
- Governing body & chair
- Texas Physician Health Program governing board — eleven members appointed by the president of the Texas Medical Board to six-year terms, one seat vacant. B. Dean McDaniel, president. Emily J. Doyle is medical director.
- Format
- Hybrid, thirteen items, including reports on enrollment, drug screening results and emergent referrals. Executive session is available for any matter involving an individual participant.
- Live video
- Microsoft Teams at bit.ly/111326TXPHP, or by telephone at 512-596-3865, conference ID 409088923.
- Full agenda
- Secretary of State Open Meeting Viewer · program board page
Board members
- B. Dean McDaniel, D.O. — president; Victoria; osteopathic physician.
- Jeffrey L. Butts, D.O. — Boerne; osteopathic physician.
- Ronald Cook, D.O. — osteopathic physician.
- Mark Kunik, M.D. — psychiatrist.
- Helaine W. Lane — Houston; non-physician member.
- Katherine McQueen, M.D. — physician.
- Sejal Mehta, M.D. — Plano; physician.
- Vicki Waters, PA-C — physician assistant.
- Michael Weaver, M.D. — addiction medicine physician.
- Susan Wynne, M.D. — San Antonio; physician.
- Vacant — one seat, empty since 2025.
Ten of eleven seats are filled. Names are from the program’s board page and its July 2026 agenda, checked November 6. Because the medical board’s president appoints these members rather than the governor, there are no appointment releases to check them against, and neither the program nor the medical board publishes term expiration dates. Only four members’ cities are given on the roster and the rest are not printed here. Board rules allot six seats to M.D.s, two to D.O.s, one to a physician assistant, one to a mental health professional and one to a public member; the posted roster does not say which member holds which seat, and the Dispatch could not reconcile it against those categories.