Colorado pharmacist's life becomes subject of TV pilot

A well-known Hollywood producer has created a television pilot based on the life of Colorado pharmacist Don Colcord.

Colcord, a graduate of University of Colorado Skaggs School of Pharmacy and owner of The Apothecary Shoppe in Nucla, Colo., was the subject of a New Yorkerprofile in 2011. That profile went viral and caught the attention of Hollywood producer Katie Jacobs.

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Jacobs, whose credits include the television show House, produced the television pilot. Actors in the pilot include John Hawkes from Deadwood as well as Chloe Sevigny and Leven Rambin from the Hunger Games.

Click here to see Colcord talk about the pilot, which has been titled Dr. Del.

According to the website IMDb, the show is about a pharmacist who returns to his hometown to run his family’s business. The fictional pharmacist struggles trying to balance his desire to distance himself from his past with his inability to turn his back on a community with few healthcare options.

In real life, the pharmacy owned by Colcord is more than two hours away from the nearest emergency care in Durango and Grand Junction. And Colcord in the only pharmacist for 4,000 square miles. About 700 people live in Nucla.

Because of the scarcity of healthcare providers in his area, Colcord is the first healthcare professional seen by many residents and often provides care for the area’s poor and underserved residents.

The popular New Yorker profile included Colcord’s account of the time he helped save the life of a young boy misdiasgnosed with flu by recognizing that he was suffering from brucellosis, a potentially deadly infection caused either by consumption of unpasteurized milk or contact with infected livestock.

The boy was taken to the emergency room and successfully treated.