Javaid Perwaiz, 69, of Chesapeake, an obstetrician and gynecologist, was arrested Friday and charged with one count of health care fraud and making false statements about health care issues, according to documents filed in U.S.District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia.
Perwaiz made his first appearance in U.S. District Court in Norfolk while still wearing his green scrubs, The Virginian-Pilot reported. He has a detention hearing scheduled Thursday.
Witnesses told investigators that Dr. Javaid Perwaiz “routinely used the ‘C’-word (cancer) to scare patients into having surgery." The authorities accuse him of performing unnecessary hysterectomies and removing one patient’s fallopian tubes. https://t.co/MuGUEQ0SUD
— The New York Times (@nytimes) November 11, 2019
Perwaiz's lawyer, Lawrence H. Woodward Jr., said his client knew he had been under investigation and was not a flight risk, the newspaper reported.
"And he's still here," Woodward told the Pilot.
According to court documents, the FBI received a tip in September 2018 from a hospital employee who suspected Perwaiz "was performing unnecessary surgeries on unsuspecting patients," The New York Times reported. The patients were not aware of the procedures Perwaiz was performing, the newspaper reported.
According to court documents, federal prosecutors accused Perwaiz of "executing a scheme" to defraud the Virginia Medical Assistance Program and Blue Cross Blue Shield by submitting false and fictitious claims from 2010 to October 2019, ABC News reported.
Perwaiz, who attended medical school in his native Pakistan, has had a medical license since at least 1980, the Pilot reported. He completed a residency at Charleston Area Medical Center.
In 1982, Perwaiz lost his privileges “due to poor clinical judgment and for performing unnecessary surgeries,” according to court documents.
The documents also said the Virginia Board of Medicine previously investigated Perwaiz for performing surgeries without appropriate medical indications and contrary to sound medical judgment, the Pilot reported. Perwaiz was censured, but only for poor record keeping.
Perwaiz has faced eight malpractice suits, including allegations he caused permanent injuries to three patients and life-threatening injuries to two others, NBC News reported.
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