More on Shantha/ICHT GA Suspends Weedkiller prescribing dr's license (finally)
- From: "Mockingbird" <mockingbirdbrain@xxxxxxxxx>
- Date: 25 Dec 2005 02:55:50 -0800
Macon Telegraph | 12/24/2005 | Georgia suspends license of indicted
doctor
http://www.macon.com/mld/macon/13477643.htm
Georgia suspends license of indicted doctor
By Don Schanche Jr.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
ATLANTA - Georgia's medical board Friday suspended the license of a
doctor accused of treating patients with a chemical used in pesticides,
and also reported that one of his patients died in 2001 of
complications from a high dose of a chemotherapy drug.
The board suspended the license of Dr. Totada Shanthaveerappa of
Stockbridge, saying his continued ability to practice medicine "poses a
threat to the public health, safety and welfare and imperatively
requires emergency action."
In the four-page order, the state Board of Medical Examiners cited the
case of a cancer patient treated by Shanthaveerappa in 2001. It said
the doctor treated the patient with a chemotherapy drug called
methotrexate in doses so high they posed "an unreasonable and
significant risk to the patient who subsequently died from
complications caused by the methotrexate."
Shanthaveerappa, 70, and a medical assistant were indicted Tuesday by a
federal grand jury on 87 counts, including health care fraud and
distributing unapproved and misbranded drugs. The doctor is also
charged with money laundering.
Prosecutors said the doctor and assistant Dan Bartoli, 63, injected
numerous patients with unapproved and misbranded drugs, including
Dinithrophenol, a commercial-grade weed killer and insecticide.
The two men also submitted false insurance claims which disguised the
types of drugs and treatments they were providing, according to the
indictment.
In its order, the medical board said it received a letter from
Shanthaveerappa on Thursday acknowledging that he had treated patients
with two drugs that have not been approved for use in the United
States, and that he had misbranded one of the drugs.
Shanthaveerappa's lawyer, Don Samuel, said his client plans to plead
not guilty on Tuesday.
Shanthaveerappa's patients have sometimes had their lives extended by
years because of his client's treatment, Samuel said
"The patients are people for whom the traditional medical field has
given up on," Samuel said. "These are patients who are told, 'There's
nothing more we can do for you - go home.' They come to Dr. Shantha as
a last resort."
Samuel said his team has collected hundreds of testimonials from
patients vouching for the doctor.
The weed killer drug prosecutors allege the doctor used is an
experimental drug regularly used overseas that was once used in the
United States as a diet medication, Samuel said.
"It happens to have the same chemicals you use to treat lawns. But so
does water," Samuel said. "There's probably something in the cookies
you eat that are used in weed killers, too."
Other allegations can be countered over the FDA's definition of a drug,
Samuel said.
"If I treated your cancer with massage therapy, that doesn't violate
the FDA because it's not a drug," he said. "They allege that some of
the experimental treatment qualifies as a drug."
Cancer doctor loses his license | ajc.com
http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/1205/24metdoctor.html
Cancer doctor loses his license
He's also charged with insurance fraud
By BILL TORPY, KATHY JEFCOATS
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 12/24/05
A doctor charged with injecting cancer patients with weedkiller and
defrauding insurance companies had his license suspended Friday
morning.
People who say that Dr. Totada R. Shanthaveerappa saved their lives
continued to rally to his defense Friday afternoon, even as two
questionable patient deaths came to light.
(ENLARGE)
Totada Shan-thaveerappa allegedly injected cancer patients with
weedkiller.
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The Georgia Medical Board of Examiners, after an emergency meeting,
voted 9-0 to recommend the suspension of Shanthaveerappa's license. He
was given notification of the suspension at his Stockbridge clinic,
said Dr. Jim McNatt, the board's medical director.
Shanthaveerappa stopped treating patients immediately, but two other
doctors at the clinic will continue their work, said Dan Conaway, a
lawyer for the doctor. Conaway said Shanthaveerappa would plead not
guilty Tuesday during his first appearance hearing in federal court.
An 87-count federal indictment accuses Shanthaveerappa, 70, also known
as T.R. Shantha, of treating patients with drugs not authorized by the
U.S. Food and Drug Administration, then falsely billing insurance
companies by saying he had used approved drugs. The indictment says
Shanthaveerappa used dinitrophenol, or DNP, a weedkiller and
insecticide, and Ukrain, which is not approved for use in the United
States.
Shanthaveerappa told the medical board that he treated patients three
years ago with DNP and still treats patients with Ukrain.
Shanthaveerappa, a native of India, who has been licensed in Georgia
since 1972, calls himself an alternative healer.
But a lawyer for cancer patient Johnny Pierce, who died last week, says
Shanthaveerappa gave Pierce false hope and contributed to his horrible
death. Pierce filed a malpractice suit last month against
Shanthaveerappa, alleging that the doctor's treatment made him
susceptible to infections that led to the removal of his colon and
allowed the cancer to spread.
Pierce's lawyer, Michael J. Hannan III, said Pierce, a musician and
songwriter from Tennessee who sang and played in Juice Newton's band in
the 1980s, was diagnosed with cancer in his tonsils in February 2004.
The tumor was removed, and Pierce was told by his doctor to get
chemotherapy and radiation treatment. But Pierce chose not to do so,
because it could have ruined his voice.
Pierce sought out alternative therapies on the Internet and found
Shanthaveerappa, who has several Web sites, including Wehealcancer.org.
According to the lawsuit, Pierce went to Stockbridge and gave
Shanthaveerappa a cashier's check for $40,000.
According to the suit, Pierce was placed into a heat chamber where his
blood was to be heated to 106 degrees. "Mr. Pierce was advised that
this would kill the cancer," the suit says. He was also given
intravenous injections.
The suit gives this description of what happened next:
On April 18, 2004, after three weeks of therapy, Pierce had a high
fever, uncontrollable shakes and severe abdominal pain. He called a
nurse from Shanthaveerappa's office, who drove him to the Henry Medical
Center. The nurse told Pierce not to tell hospital officials he was
seeing Shanthaveerappa, because "they don't like him at this hospital."
He was transferred to Emory Medical Center, where he was operated on.
"They found he had a raging infection in his abdomen," Hannan said in
an interview Friday. Pierce also had aplastic anemia. Surgeons removed
his colon, and he later received a colonostomy.
Hannan said Shanthaveerappa treated Pierce with low-dose chemotherapy,
not enough to stop the cancer but enough to weaken his immune system
and allow infection to spread.
"His immune system was completely compromised. Shantha's treatment gave
him false hope. It didn't give him the chance conventional treatment
would have."
The medical board, in the suspension ruling, referred to another
unnamed patient who died in 2001 from high doses of methotrexate, a
chemotherapeutic agent. Pierce, according to his lawsuit, was also
treated with methotrexate and Ukrain.
But at Shanthaveerappa's office Friday, Connie Mahoney of McDonough
proudly displayed a lab test result showing that her ovarian cancer was
in remission. The cancer had spread into her abdomen, she said, and she
underwent multiple surgeries and conventional treatment before finding
Shanthaveerappa on the Internet.
"I am officially in remission after three months of treatment," she
said. "I will defend the doctor to my end."
Mahoney said she was treated intravenously at the clinic three days a
week for four hours a day. She said Shanthaveerappa treated her with
Ukrain, which is made in Austria, as well as vitamin C and
hypertherapy, or heating of the blood.
"Ukrain has been used in Europe for decades," Mahoney said. "I got
comparable treatments in Europe for three weeks at $25,000. To pay Dr.
Shantha $20,000 for unlimited treatments is a bargain, especially now I
know it works. I spent a lot of money on alternative treatments, and I
am in debt. But it is money more than well spent."
After being out of work on disability for six months, Mahoney said, she
will go back to work Jan. 2.
Shanthaveerappa can appeal his suspension, either by asking for an
expedited hearing before a state administrative law judge or by going
to Superior Court to request a restraining order against the
suspension.
WTVY | Pesticide Prescription
http://www.wtvynews4.com/home/headlines/2107632.html
Pesticide Prescription
11:23 AM Dec 22, 2005
Associated Press
Patients of a doctor who's been accused of using a chemical found in
pesticides and weed killer to treat people say they still support him.
An 87-count federal indictment accuses Doctor Totada R. Shanthaveerappa
of health care fraud and money laundering.
But Shanthaveerappa, a native of India who is also known as T.R.
Shantha, continued seeing patients yesterday, one day after being
indicted.
Nancy Hoffman delivered a tray of Christmas cookies to Shanthaveerappa
and said he saved her life.
Others said Shanthaveerappa gave them hope after other cancer
treatments were exhausted.
Yaro Garcia and her mother, Isabell Santos, came to the Stockbridge
clinic from Naples, Florida, to get help for Santos' brain and breast
cancer.
Federal prosecutors say Shanthaveerappa treated cancer patients with
dinitrophenol -- or D-N-P -- a weed killer and insecticide chemical;
Ukrain; and hyperbaric oxygen therapy.
.
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