A Georgia doctor has agreed to pay the federal government $20 million in order to resolve allegations that he billed the government for procedures that were unnecessary or that were performed in a substandard manner.

Dr. Robert Windsor was accused of an array of practices that purportedly constitute health care fraud.

Dr. Windsor is the CEO of National Pain Care Inc., a Marietta, Georgia-based company, and the director of Physician Services PSC, a company housed in the same building as NPC.

He and staff at his clinics allegedly conducted medical examinations in closets as well as in rooms that had floor-to-ceiling glass walls, collected payments for monitoring surgeries he did not actually monitor, and billed the government for unnecessary tests and procedures that took place between January 2010 and June 2014.

Whistleblowers Brought Multiple Allegations of Health Care Fraud

The allegations in the instant suit were filed by two whistleblowers who worked at various facilities controlled by Dr. Windsor and his companies.

The whistleblowers stated that Dr. Windsor and his companies knowingly submitted false claims to the government that resulted in the government paying for testing, exams, medical equipment and procedures that were inappropriate.

At the time the health care fraud complaint was filed, Dr. Windsor’s companies were serving approximately 140,000 patients each year at 15 locations across Georgia, Kentucky, Ohio and Florida.

Of these patients, many were addicted to or dependent on pain killers prescribed by the doctors but were made to undergo a variety of procedures that were unnecessary in order to secure a prescription, the whistleblowers stated.

In these visits, patients were required to complete urine drug screenings, the whistleblowers said.

After the urine screening, patients were given an exam by a mid-level provider. These exams allegedly took place in rooms that were not suited to that purpose. The rooms included conference rooms, business offices, a closet, and even a room with floor-to-ceiling clear glass walls.

These rooms lacked necessary equipment to adequately perform examinations and they lacked the necessary components in order to privately conduct an appropriate examination, the whistleblowers described.

Without having the proper space and equipment, the exams that were conducted there were inadequate, the whistleblowers stated. But following the examinations, the providers created and submitted records containing false information describing the exams as more extensive than they actually were, the lawsuit alleged.

Additionally, due to understaffing, conducting exams commensurate with the rate for which the services were billed was essentially impossible, the health care fraud whistleblowers said.

Not long before this health care fraud lawsuit was settled, a federal judge in Georgia hit Dr. Windsor with a $20 million penalty in a different case brought forth by another whistleblower over similar claims.

The two payments will not be combined. Dr. Windsor’s total payment across both cases will come to $20 million.

The Health Care Fraud Whistleblower Lawsuits are Case No. 5:14­-cv­-00221 in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky and Case No. 1:12­-cv­-03114 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia