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A former Huntsville pain doctor has reached a plea agreement with federal prosecutors in which he agreed to serve 15 years in prison, according to the U.S. Attorneys office in Birmingham.
Shelinder Aggarwal, 48, also agreed to pay $6.7 million and forfeit his clinic on Turner Street in Huntsville’s medical district as part of the plea agreement.
Aggarwal agreed to plead guilty to illegally prescribing controlled substances and with a health care fraud involving $9.5 million in unneeded and unused urine tests, according to the announcement by U.S. Attorney Joyce White Vance and FBI Special Agent in Charge Roger Stanton.
A judge still must approve the plea agreement, according to the announcement.
Vance described Aggarwal as “a drug dealer masquerading as a doctor.”
Aggarwal surrendered his Alabama medical license in 2013, along with his Alabama and federal Drug Enforcement Administration certificates to prescribe controlled substances, after the Alabama Board of Medical Examiners initiated an investigation.
A 2014 report by ProPublica described Aggarwal as Medicare’s top prescriber of prescription painkillers in 2012. According to prosecutors, Alabama pharmacies filled about 110,000 prescriptions written by Aggarwal – which breaks down to 423 prescriptions per day with a five-day work week.
The urine tests were conducted solely so Aggarwal could bill Medicare, prosecutors said. Aggarwal frequently ignored the test results, prosecutors said. Between January 2011 and March 2013, Aggarwal received $9.5 million in Medicare reimbursements, prosecutors said.
“Shelinder Aggarwal treated his medical license like a license to deal opiate drugs,” Vance said. “He also defrauded Medicare and Blue Cross Blue Shield of more than $9 million dollars by performing drug tests he never used to treat his patients. Thanks to this prosecution, Aggarwal is no longer a drug dealer masquerading as a doctor. His pill mill is closed, he must repay the money he stole from health insurers, and he will serve time for his crimes. I am grateful to our prosecutors and the investigators who brought this individual to justice.”
“Aggarwal was trusted with resources to care for others and used that access to defraud the health care system, thus costing tax payers millions of dollars,” the FBI’s Stanton said. “In addition, he directly contributed to the opioid drug epidemic which is plaguing our nation, and potentially endangered the lives of his patients. I applaud the work of my agents and our partners to shut down Aggarwal’s pill mill and hold him accountable for his actions.”
According to the announcement from the U.S. Attorneys office, Aggarwal was a pain management doctor who operated Chronic Pain Care Services in Huntsville. His medical practice was a pill mill, according to the charges and plea agreement. The documents state that in 2012, about 80 to 145 patients a day visited Aggarwal’s clinic, with him seeing the majority of patients and writing all prescriptions.
Initial patient visits typically lasted five minutes or less, and follow-ups two minutes or less. The documents state that Aggarwal did not obtain prior medical records for his patients, did not treat patients with anything other than controlled substances, often asked patients what medications they wanted and filled their requests, prescribed controlled substances to patients who he knew were using illegal drugs, and did not take appropriate measures to ensure that patients did not divert or abuse controlled substances.
The plea agreement summarizes an interaction with a patient, which was captured on video. In it, Aggarwal notes that the DEA viewed him as the “biggest pill-pusher in North Alabama” and that many of his patients were “dropping like flies, they are all dying.”