September 15, 2024 Recent Legal News
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US v Panigrahy
Indicted
Dr. Ashok Panigrahy, the former chief of radiology at UPMC Children's Hospital has been indicted for possessing material depicting sexual exploitation of a minor.
Patients v Hoefs
Filed
Fifteen patients have filed a suit against Dr. John Hoefs, for allegedly sexually abusing patients. The suit also names Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian, UC Regents and Lover Specialty Center. It is alleged that the doctor had the female patients disrobe, fondling them and grabbing them for no medical reason. The doctor was not an employee of Hoag.
Florida v Melgar
Arrest Warrant
Florida authorities are looking for Juan Carlos Melgar for practicing medicine without a license. He had been arrested in 2023 but bonded out of jail and is now on the loose.
US v Bethi
guilty
Lakshmi Beti, DDS, of New Haven, Connecticut, plead guilty to charges of paying recruiters to attend dental appointments so she could bill Medicaid. She paid the recruiters out of the proceeds of her ill gotten gains.
US v Patel
Settlement
Dr. Vishal Patel of Wilmington, Delaware, has agreed to pay $1,080,000 to settle allegations that he signed prescriptions for DME without examining patients for a telemed company.
US v Walgreens
Settlement
Walgreens agreed to pay $106.8 million to settle allegations by whistleblowers that they billed for prescriptions to fed med that were never dispensed. They had previously paid $66.3 million for reimbursement for the never picked up meds. One whistleblower got $14.92 million and another $1.62 million.
US v Community Oncology Alliance
DC DC
The court stated that the law is clear. Physicians are not allowed to mail prescriptions to patient homes. The CMS guidance prohibiting doctors from dispensing drugs in locations outside of their offices is a correct interpretation of the statute.
US v THD America
Settlement
The Massachusetts medical device company has agreed to pay $700,000 to resolve allegations that they knowingly caused physicians to upcode for reimbursement.
Patients v Atlantic General Hospital
Settlement
The Berlin, Maryland, hospital agreed to pay a fine of $2.5 million to settle allegations that they allowed via poor security hackers to do a ransomware attact on the poorly protected hospital.
Gantt v Novo Nordisk
Filed
The patient was prescribed Wegovy and Ozempic for weight loss. Months later she wass found unconscious and needed emergency surgery for an infarction of the colon. She blames the meds for not having warnings about this particular problem. She is not suing her physician. She also states she was massively overweight and that she requested the meds from her physician. There is no evidence to say one way or another whether if she knew this was a very rare occurrence she would still have taken the drug.
Bealing, McCreary v Emory University
Filed
They are suing claiming that Emory didn't provide medical treatment to Bealing who was 38 weeks pregnant. She had had an exam by her physician earlier in the day and all was OK. Then later at home she had severe abdominal pain and bleeding heavily along with trouble breathing. She went to the Emory ED and instead of being seen immediately she was given papers to fill out including a voluntary arbitration agreement. She refused to sign the agreement and after a time and without being seen she left the hospital voluntarily and went to another hospital where her unborn son was pronounced dead.
Doe v Lopez
Jury Verdict
Dr. Berto Lopez of the Palm Beach, Florida area was found negligent in the severing of a baby's penis during a circumcision. The parents were awarded $100 million. Of course that will never be paid. The OB/GYN had also been named in four disciplinary matters and nine malpractice events. His license had actually been revoked when he did the circumcision. That was due to a patient death due to post partum hemorrhage.
Patients v Asante Rogue Regional Medical Center
Filed
The hospital was sued by multiple patients after it was found that a nurse substituted IV narcotics with nonsterile tap water. This is a second suit filed. A prior one was for one patient.
Bryan v Shaknovsky, Ascension Sacred Heart Emerald Coast
Hospital
Filed
The plaintiff was staying in his vacation condo in Destin, Florida, when he got left side abdominal pains. He wanted to go back to his home in Alabama but was persuaded by the hospital chief medical officer and the surgeon Dr. Thomas Shaknovsky to stay and have the needed spleen surgery there. The surgeon allegedly took out the liver instead of the spleen which caused him to bleed to death. The autopsy showed the original problem was a ruptured splenic cyst that was contained.
Patients v Yale
Settlement
Yale has agreed to pay money to dozens of women who say they had pain during IVF treatments after a nurse diverted fentanyl for her personal use and injected the patients with saline instead.
Doe v University of South Carolina
Filed
The parents of a minor female have sued the University. The daughter has cerebral palsy and underwent an operation on her spine. The parents claim the physicians put the screws in the wrong place causing the daughter's paralysis. The surgeon changed the position of the screws 11 days after the original operation.
Regala v McDonald
Fla District Ct
McDonald sued Dr. Regala for medical malpractice and Physicians Day Surgical Center for negligent credentialing. They wanted Dr. Regala's credentialing file. The Court said that even under Florida's 7 an institution does not have to turn over a credentialing file that would be otherwise privileged just because a negligent credentialing action is filed. One needs to establish that an adverse medical event has been established wich is post trial that the plaintiff has already won.
DISCLAIMER: Although this article is updated periodically, it reflects the author's point of view at the time of publication. Nothing in this article constitutes legal advice. Readers should consult with their own legal counsel before acting on any of the information presented.