Hyatt May Face 200 Lawsuits by Ex-Patients

A mugshot of Dr. Brian Hyatt at the Benton County jail (Benton County jail)

Dr. Brian Hyatt, the former chair of the Arkansas State Medical Board, is facing 102 lawsuits from former patients, and attorneys anticipate filing another 100 cases against him.

The suits are brought by patients who allege they were unlawfully held against their will at the Behavioral Health Unit of Northwest Medical Center-Springdale, which also has been named as a defendant.

“The scheme was a resounding financial success, tripling the size of BHU, and resulting in what [a plaintiff] estimates to be hundreds of millions of dollars in illicit medical billing claims,” said a filing by the Odom Law Firm of Fayetteville and Aaron Cash of the Herrera Law Group of Rogers.

”Patients affected by these egregious actions continue to come forward daily,” an attorney for the plaintiffs, Monte Sharits of the Odom Law Firm, said in a statement to Arkansas Business.

Although the former patients allege similar things happened to them, they were at the hospital at different times and their alleged damages are all slightly different, meaning the cases vary enough to prevent the lawsuits from being combined into one and tried as a class action.

The plaintiffs’ attorneys received a victory at the end of January when Washington County Circuit Judge Doug Martin ruled that a plaintiff’s case could continue even though some of the allegations of wrongdoing were filed outside the statute of limitations.

The Odom Law Firm and Cash had argued that the hospital hid material facts. “This fraudulent scheme was so well concealed that for over four years it eluded the attention of state and federal law enforcement, and fooled state and federal regulators whose job it was to audit the claims stemming from Northwest Medical Center’s Behavioral Health Unit,” according to a filing by the plaintiffs’ attorneys. “Even Northwest itself denies any awareness of the fraud perpetrated against patients within the BHU.”

Christina Bull, a spokeswoman for Northwest Health, said that it’s not the hospital’s practice to comment on pending litigation.

“We take very seriously our responsibility to provide a safe environment of care for our patients and our team members,” Bull said via email. “Dr. Hyatt was an independent physician who had previously seen patients at our facility, and was independently responsible for the care he provided and billing for that care. Dr. Hyatt has not provided care at our facility since May 2022.”

Meanwhile, Hyatt, the owner of Pinnacle Premier Psychiatry of Rogers, was charged in November with two counts of felony Medicaid fraud in Pulaski County Circuit Court. His trial is expected to start Sept. 17 and last nine days.

The Class A felony counts stem from more than $300,000 in fraudulent Medicaid claims that Hyatt allegedly filed between Jan. 1, 2022, and April 29, 2022, when he worked at the Northwest Medical Center-Springdale Inpatient Behavioral Health Unit. Hyatt is accused of billing for Medicaid patients he didn’t see or spent little time with.

He has denied the allegations of wrongdoing in the cases.

Hyatt still has his medical license even though he faces criminal charges.

“Dr. Hyatt has an active medical license because to the Board’s knowledge he has closed his medical practice and is not working or using his Arkansas medical license,” the Arkansas State Medical Board said via email in response to questions from Arkansas Business. “The charges pending against Dr. Hyatt are non-violent Medicaid fraud allegations. He has not been convicted of any charges at this time.”

While other doctors have had their licenses suspended while criminal charges were pending, “the Board makes its decisions on the individual facts of each case,” the board said.