Convicted cardiologist faces lawsuit

• By JASON BROWN
• Advocate Acadiana bureau
• Published: Nov 25, 2009 - Page: 1BA

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LAFAYETTE — The U.S. Attorney’s Office has intervened in a civil lawsuit seeking damages and penalties against a cardiologist sentenced earlier this year to 10 years in prison on health-care fraud charges.

Dr. Mehmood M. Patel is out on bail pending an appeal of his December conviction of 51 counts of health-care fraud.

Patel was accused of billing government and private insurers for more than $2 million in unnecessary heart procedures.

The federal False Claims Act lawsuit presents the same allegations. The suit seeks reimbursement and triple damages for false health-care claims.

One of Patel’s former associates, Dr. Christopher Mallavarapu, originally filed the lawsuit, which led to the criminal investigation.

The false claims lawsuit allows citizens to file an action on behalf of the United States and receive a portion of the recovery, which ranges from 15 to 25 percent of the monetary damages, according to a news release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office. Patel faces a possible civil penalty from $5,500 to $11,000 for each false claim submitted for payment, the release stated.

U.S. Attorney Donald Washington did not have the exact number of claims Patel filed.

“Those counts in the criminal indictment were picked based upon trial strategies and what we thought was necessary to prove beyond a reasonable doubt to get the result that we were seeking against Dr. Patel,” Washington said Tuesday.

“Those were not by any stretch of the imagination the only false claims that we believe were submitted to the government.”

He added the civil case “will now look at not only those that were presented in the criminal litigation but also many, many more that have been alleged in the civil complaint.”

The lawsuit also names Patel’s cardiac catherization lab, Acadiana Cardiovascular Center, as a defendant.

Previously, Lafayette General Medical Center and Our Lady of Lourdes Regional Medical Center each agreed to settlements with Mallavarapu and the Justice Department in false claims litigation stemming from procedures Patel performed there.

Lafayette General paid $1.9 million while Our Lady of Lourdes paid $3.8 million.