Fifth lawsuit filed against JoCo doctor and the maker of the opioids he prescribed
A fifth lawsuit has been filed in Kansas against an opioid maker accused of bribing doctors to prescribe its powerful fentanyl spray and an Overland Park doctor the plaintiffs say participated in the scheme.
The suit, filed in a Johnson County court last week, is similar to three others brought in Johnson County and a fourth one in Leavenworth County against Insys Therapeutics and Steven Simon, formerly of Mid-America Physiatrists.
This suit was filed by Timothy Farquhar, who saw Simon from 2001 to 2017 for pain related to a spinal injury and cyanide poisoning. Simon allegedly prescribed him unnecessarily high doses of opioids, including the fentanyl spray Subsys, without informing him of the risks of addiction or overdose.
“Plaintiff became dependent upon and addicted to opioid pain medications, including Subsys, which were repeatedly prescribed to him without proper medical care, treatment or justification,” the suit alleges.
Simon’s attorney didn’t respond to a request for comment for this story on Monday. But in the past he and Simon have both said the doctor’s prescriptions were based solely on clinical judgment, not payments from drug makers.
Subsys, sprayed under the tongue for quick action, was approved by the Food and Drug Administration only for treating “breakthrough cancer pain.”
But Insys, seeking to expand the market for the drug, encouraged doctors to prescribe Subsys for people who didn’t have active cancer, according to the U.S. Department of Justice and several whistleblower lawsuits.
The federal government has also alleged that Insys illegally used its physician speaker program to pay kickbacks to doctors, based on how much Subsys they prescribed.
The Star reported last year that Simon was the top-paid Subsys speaker in Kansas and among the top 10 nationwide, taking in more than $200,000 from 2013 to 2015.
Three weeks later the FBI served a search warrant at Simon’s clinic, and Simon’s former partner told The Star that federal agents seized patient records for everyone for whom Simon prescribed oral fentanyl.
Simon has not been charged with any crimes.
Federal prosecutors have levied criminal charges against a half-dozen Insys executives and the company’s billionaire founder, John Kapoor. They’ve pleaded not guilty and have a trial scheduled for January in Boston.
Kapoor and several others are also named as defendants in the suits against Simon.
Lawsuits unsealed in May revealed that the Insys sales rep who frequented Simon’s office, Torgny Andersson, was one of several whisteblowers who helped the feds build their case.