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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
The world lost some incredible physicians in 2022, including a humanitarian who dedicated his life to global health, specialists who advanced their fields and were beloved by patients, and a family physician who gave his life to save fellow churchgoers. Among those who represented the best in medicine were doctors who rushed to aid Ukrainians, dispelled COVID myths, and created ways to noninvasively test for fetal anomalies. The worst in the profession included a psychiatrist who attempted to murder her child's father, pain and addiction specialists who used and defrauded their vulnerable patients, and a physician who defrauded veterans.
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
Doctor Enlists Colleagues to Aid Sex Trafficking Survivors
Sex trafficking not only involves the use of force, fraud, or coercion to get someone to engage in commercial sex acts, but traffickers often brand their victims with tattoos that convey ownership. Hearing of the thousands of survivors who could benefit from removal of those tattoos, Paul M. Friedman, MD, president of the American Society for Laser Medicine and Surgery (ASLMS), put out an urgent call to ASLMS members, encouraging them to offer their services pro bono. With Friedman's guidance, the ASLMS has put together a national directory of board-certified ASLMS members who have agreed to remove branding tattoos free of charge. The program is being run in collaboration with the National Trafficking Sheltered Alliance.
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
Equity Warrior Wins AMA Excellence in LGBTQ Health Award
Oni Blackstock, MD, MHS, was honored by the American Medical Association (AMA) for her innovation and leadership in LGBTQ+ policy, advocacy, patient care, and workforce diversity. The 44-year-old Blackstock — a Harvard-trained primary care and HIV physician — is a thought leader and influencer in health equity, said the AMA. She is the founder and executive director of Health Justice, a consulting firm that helps healthcare and public health organizations center anti-racism and equity in the workplace and reduce health inequities in their communities. As a former assistant commissioner at New York City's Bureau of HIV, Blackstock established the first racial equity program in the city health department, leading to improved workforce equity and more equitable policies in administration and programs.
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
Paul Farmer, One of Medicine's Great Humanitarians, Dies at 62
Paul Farmer, MD, infectious disease specialist and humanitarian, died of an acute cardiac event on February 21, 2022. Farmer, 62, was at a hospital he helped established in Butaro, Rwanda. A global health icon, Farmer traveled to Haiti in the 1980s to combat HIV and AIDS and founded a network of clinics there, and he cofounded Boston-based Partners In Health to provide care to the poor. Profiled in a 2003 book, Mountains Beyond Mountains: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, a Man Who Would Cure the World, Farmer also was the subject of a 2017 film, Bending the Arc, and was the author of 12 books. He was Kolokotrones University Professor and chair of the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School and chief of the Division of Global Health Equity at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston.
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
Ukrainian Psychiatrist Rushes Supplies to His Countrymen
Soon after Russia attacked Ukraine in February 2022, child and adolescent psychiatrist Dennis Ougrin, MBBS, PhD, felt the need to rush into action. The Lviv-born physician, a consultant child and adolescent psychiatrist leading the Enhanced Treatment Service at South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust, called colleagues at the Lviv Military Hospital. They were in desperate need of supplies to treat wounded soldiers. Within days, Ougrin and his wife Roxanne Litynska drove a carload of first aid kits and a portable ultrasound machine from London to the Polish border town of Przemyśl. Back in London, Ougrin recruited students and colleagues to regularly assemble first aid kits and deliver them to his countrymen.
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
Hero Family Doctor Murdered While Trying to Disarm Mass Shooter
Colleagues were not surprised to hear that John Cheng, MD, a family and sports medicine physician and martial arts enthusiast, confronted a gunman who opened fire on May 15 inside Geneva Presbyterian Church in Laguna Woods, California. Cheng, 52, was struck multiple times and died at the scene. His action allowed others to disable the gunman and prevented further fatalities. Five others were hurt. Colleagues and former schoolmates at his undergraduate alma mater, Baylor University, remembered Cheng as compassionate and funny, and devoted to faith and community, including volunteering as physician for the local high school football team. In a 2012 video, Cheng said his father — a small-town Texas physician — inspired him to become a doctor. Cheng is survived by his wife and two children.
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
Disparities Expert Becomes New JAMA Editor-in-Chief
A year after JAMA was accused of hosting a racist podcast, the publication announced Kirsten Bibbins-Domingo, MD, PhD, as its new editor-in-chief. Bibbins-Domingo, an internist, cardiovascular disease epidemiologist, and leader in addressing health disparities, is the first person of color to serve in that position. She is Lee Goldman, MD, Endowed Professor of Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, School of Medicine and co-founded the UCSF Center for Vulnerable Populations at the Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital. Bibbins-Domingo led the US Preventive Services Task Force as vice-chair and chair from 2014-2017. The American Heart Association gave her its 2022 Population Research Prize, saying that her work "examines the impacts race, ethnicity and other social determinants of health play in the development of hypertension and other forms of heart disease," adding that she is also a committed mentor to underrepresented persons in medicine.
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
Clinician Recognized for Pioneering Microbiome Work
The National Academy of Medicine (NAM) gave Jeffrey I. Gordon, MD, the first-ever $50,000 David and Beatrix Hamburg Award for Advances in Biomedical Research and Clinical Medicine for his work in transforming understanding of how human physiology is shaped by microbial communities. Research conducted by Gordon, the Dr. Robert J. Glaser Distinguished University Professor and director of the Edison Family Center for Genome Sciences and Systems Biology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, "has altered germ theory and knowledge of the microbial contributions to noncommunicable diseases, as well as ushered in a new era of microbiome-based therapeutics and preventive medicine," said NAM. He was also recognized for training future scientists; more than 140 PhD students and postdoctoral fellows have worked in his lab.
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
Medical Educator Awarded Prize for His Decades-Long Impact
Kevin Eva, MD, is passionate about introducing scientific rigor — and diverse perspectives — to medical education and health professions research. "His work has also advanced understanding of clinical reasoning, guided improvements in experts' ratings of student performance, and fundamentally altered how the field thinks about self-assessment, feedback and their role in performance improvement," said Stockholm-based Karolinska Institutet, which has awarded Eva its 2022 Prize for Research in Medical Education. Eva is associate director and senior scientist in the Centre for Health Education Scholarship and professor and director of Educational Research and Scholarship in the Department of Medicine at the University of British Columbia. He is also editor-in-chief of the journal Medical Education. Eva told Karolinska Institutet that his work spans all phases of health professionals' lives, "ranging from issues of student selection through to maintenance of competence for ageing practitioners."
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
Innovative Plastic Surgeon, First to Treat 'Napalm Girl,' Dies
Chicago plastic surgeon Randall McNally, MD, died on July 25, 2022, at 92. In 1972, the Air Force veteran flew to Vietnam to identify the bodies of relatives killed when their plane was bombed. He volunteered at a Saigon hospital, where he worked on dozens of children, including 9-year-old Kim Phùc Phan Thi, the South Vietnamese girl photographed by Associated Press photographer Nick Ut as she fled from a napalm attack. Phùc credits McNally with saving her life. The two remained close until his death. McNally previously was resident doctor for the Chicago Blackhawks, chairman of Rush University Medical Center's plastic and reconstructive surgery department, and associate dean of surgical services at Rush Medical School. He is survived by eight children, 28 grandchildren, and 14 great-grandchildren.
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
Marthe Gautier, 'Forgotten' Discoverer of Trisomy 21, Dies
Marthe Gautier, a French physician involved in the discovery of the extra chromosome that causes Down syndrome, died on April 30, 2022, in Paris at 96. As a young woman in the 1950s, Gautier worked at Paris' Trousseau Hospital as chief pediatric cardiology resident under Raymond Turpin, who assigned her to develop cell cultures to study morphologic anomalies, including those caused by what was then called "mongolism." She created a dye that allowed her to identify the extra chromosome. However, another Turpin student, Jerome Lejeune, subsequently took credit for the discovery. Although Gautier was listed as an author on the seminal paper, she was marginalized until 2014 when the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research declared her the true pioneer. Still, after Gautier's death, the Lejeune Foundation insisted that Lejeune deserved sole credit.
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
Vaccine Proponent, Myth-Buster Wins AMA Scientific Achievement Award
Peter Hotez, MD, a longtime proponent of childhood vaccination and champion of global health — and a vaccine misinformation and disinformation myth-buster — was awarded the American Medical Association's Scientific Achievement Award for 2022. A professor of pediatrics and molecular virology and microbiology at Baylor College of Medicine, where he is also co-director of the Texas Children's Center for Vaccine Development, Hotez is the father of an adult daughter with autism and author of Vaccines Did Not Cause Rachel's Autism. He has been a go-to source for dispelling myths about COVID-19 vaccines. Hotez' lab developed Corbevax, a low-cost recombinant protein COVID vaccine, authorized in India. His lab is also working on vaccines for human hookworm, schistosomiasis, Chagas disease and leishmaniasis, severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), ascariasis (roundworm), and trichuris (whipworm).
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
Beloved Giant of Genitourinary Oncology Dies at 72
Nicholas Vogelzang, MD, FACP, FASCO, a world-renowned oncologist dedicated to advancing genitourinary oncology and mesothelioma through groundbreaking clinical trials, died September 20, 2022. As part of Medscape's Oncology editorial board, Vogelzang contributed expert interviews and opinions. Vogelzang joined the University of Chicago faculty in 1983 and was the inaugural Fred C. Buffet Professor and director of the Cancer Research Center from 1999 to 2003. He was director of the Nevada Cancer Institute and, later, a genitourinary oncologist at Comprehensive Cancer Centers of Nevada. Patients warmly recalled Vogelzang's caring and personal touch in a Las Vegas Review-Journal obituary. He served on the American Society of Clinical Oncology board from 1993 to 1996, was a founding board member of the Mesothelioma Applied Research Foundation, helped found the Kidney Cancer Association, and was vice chair of the Southwest Oncology Group's Genitourinary Committee for 14 years. Vogelzang had his share of personal trials: Hodgkin disease, open heart surgery, the loss of a child, and his wife's sarcoma.
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
Psychiatrist Gets 11 Years for Role in Sledgehammer Attack on Ex
A New York psychiatrist was sentenced to 11 years in state prison for her role in the attempted murder of her child's father, also a psychiatrist. Pamela Buchbinder, MD — who has been precluded from practicing in New York pending licensing authorities' investigation — enlisted the help of her then-19-year-old cousin to kill Michael Weiss, MD. Buchbinder was in a custody battle with Weiss over their child, who was 5 years old at the time. In 2012, Buchbinder's cousin beat Weiss with a sledgehammer and stabbed him multiple times, but Weiss survived. Buchbinder has been held at Rikers Island prison, in East Elmhurst, New York, since she was arrested in 2017. She has already served 5 years of her 11-year sentence. She must also serve 5 years of post-release probation.
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
Psychiatrist's License Revoked After Alleged Sexual Assaults
The Osteopathic Medical Board of California in March revoked the license of Santa Rosa psychiatrist Cuyler Burns Goodwin, DO, after it alleged that he sexually assaulted two patients during ketamine treatments — with no other staff present. The board was seeking $65,000 to cover the costs of its investigation, but Goodwin is not currently facing any criminal charges. He has denied the allegations.
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
Addiction Treatment Specialist Uses Patients to Defraud Insurers
A federal jury convicted Palm Beach County, Florida psychiatrist Mark Agresti, MD, 59, of fraudulently billing $110 million in medically unnecessary urinalysis for patients at Good Decisions Sober Living (GDSL).
As GDSL medical director, Agresti provided standing orders for urinalysis for GDSL patients in exchange for a monthly fee. He did not review results, and tests were not used to guide treatment. At trial, Agresti said he'd been manipulated into the scheme by the GDSL owner, who had pled guilty. But evidence showed that Agresti had engaged in a similar scheme at other addiction facilities in the area. He also had GDSL patients visit his private practice so he could unlawfully bill for services there. Prosecutors called it "an egregious, multimillion-dollar fraud scheme that exploited vulnerable substance abusers." Agresti faced 10-20 years in prison but ultimately was sentenced to 8 years.
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
Doctor Convicted in $10 Million Scheme That Defrauded Veterans
Arkansas family physician Joe David May, MD, was convicted for his participation in a scheme that defrauded TRICARE, the insurance program for veterans. May, along with a childhood friend and a medical sales representative, recruited veterans to sign up for compounded pain creams, whether needed or not. TRICARE paid over $12 million for the medications, said the US Attorney for the Eastern District of Arkansas. In return for a $15,000 payoff, May signed off on at least 226 prescriptions over 10 months — without consulting or examining patients — costing TRICARE $4.63 million. May's license is suspended. He faces up to 20 years in prison for fraud, mail fraud, falsifying records, and violation of antikickback laws and would serve an additional 4 years for convictions on two counts of aggravated identity theft.
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
"Goodie Bag" Pill Mill Doctor Sentenced to Two Decades in Prison
A federal judge ordered Andrew Berkowitz, MD, 62, of Huntington Valley, Pennsylvania, to serve 20 years in prison and 5 years of supervised release, and to pay a $40,000 fine and almost $4 million in restitution — the amount he allegedly reaped from his fraudulent billing for medically unnecessary physical therapy, acupuncture, and chiropractic adjustments and prescriptions. All of Berkowitz' patients — no matter their complaint — received tote bags filled with medications, including muscle relaxers; anti-inflammatories; anti-anxiety drugs; and controlled substances, like tramadol, said federal officials. Berkowitz also prescribed oxycodone to "pill-seeking" patients. In addition to the court-ordered time and fines, Berkowitz must also pay about $1.8 million to the federal government for submitting false Medicare claims.
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
"Comfort Drinks" at Sober Homes Gets Doctor 54 Months
Psychiatrist Jose Santeiro, MD, of Miami Lakes, Florida, was sentenced to 54 months in prison after being convicted at trial for billing $112 million for addiction treatment services that were never provided or were medically unnecessary. Santeiro was medical director of two centers where the fraud occurred: Compass Detox, an inpatient facility, and WAR Network, a related outpatient program. Patients were bribed to come to the facilities and given illegal drugs; they were often shuttled from inpatient to outpatient and back again to maximize billing. Federal prosecutors said Santeiro also prescribed detox patients with a sedative "comfort drink" to ensure that they stayed at the facility and would come back for more. The Florida Board of Medicine has not disciplined Santeiro. His license is "delinquent," which means he failed to renew it when it expired in January 2022. As a result, he is barred from practicing.
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
Ex–Cardiology Chief Sentenced for Sexual Abuse of Fellow
The former chief of cardiology at the VA Hospital in Palo Alto from 1985 to 2018 who also was director of the Stanford Cardiology Fellowship program was sentenced to 8 months in prison for felony abusive sexual contact of a female physician whom he was supervising. John Giacomini, MD, 73, of Atherton, pled guilty in March, admitting that beginning in 2017, he'd subjected the cardiology fellow to forcible kissing, touching, and groping even after she'd explicitly said she was not interested in a relationship. His behavior led the fellow to quit the VA program. Stanford Medicine placed Giacomini on leave in 2018 when the accusations emerged; he retired soon after the school completed its investigation. Before his sentencing, a number of former colleagues and current Stanford faculty members wrote in support of Giacomini's character. Prosecutors said it highlighted the disparity in power between perpetrator and victim. The Medical Board of California revoked Giacomini's license after his guilty plea.
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
New Jersey Rheumatologist Convicted of $8.8 Million Fraud
A federal jury convicted Fort Lee, New Jersey, rheumatologist Alice Chu, MD for defrauding Medicare and private insurers for services that she never provided, according to the Justice department. Evidence showed that from 2010 to 2019 Chu's New Life Rheumatology Center billed almost $9 million for infusions of rituximab (Rituxan), a biologic used to treat rheumatoid arthritis, but that she had never actually purchased the medication. Chu was also convicted of billing for allergy services that were never provided. Chu's office manager and biller — who was charged separately and cooperated--testified that Chu falsely billed for knee injections for her that she never received. The rheumatologist had not been sentenced as of press time. Her medical license is in good standing with the New Jersey State Board of Medical Examiners.
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
Internist to Serve 3 Years, Pay $9.5 Million to Resolve Fraud Charges
Los Angeles County internist Minas Kochumian, MD, agreed to pay nearly $9.5 million to resolve accusations that he submitted false claims to Medicare and to California's Medicaid program, Medi-Cal. Kochumian agreed to pay $5.4 million to California to settle the state's criminal case and was sentenced to 3 years and 5 months in prison. He will pay another $4.1 million to the federal government. Kochumian's Northridge-based California Medical and Rehabilitation Group submitted false claims for procedures including injections to treat osteoarthritis and osteoporosis, draining tailbone cysts, and removal of various growths. The internist's former medical assistant and former information technology consultant brought the false billing to the government's attention through a whistleblower suit, allowing them to receive $1.75 million of the payout. Kochumian's license has been suspended.
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Physicians of the Year 2022: Best and Worst
Alicia Ault | December 30, 2022 | Contributor Information
Fertility Doctor Used His Own Sperm to Impregnate Patient
A Vermont federal jury in March awarded Cheryl Rousseau $5.25 million to be paid by John Boyd Coates III, MD, of Shelburne. In August, after being petitioned by Coates' lawyers, a federal judge halved the award, saying that the $5 million in punitive damages was excessive. Rousseau said that in 1977, Coates agreed to inseminate her with sperm from an unnamed medical student who resembled her husband. Coates used his own sperm instead, and his parentage was discovered after an ancestry test taken by Rousseau's daughter. The ob/gyn admitted his behavior in the face of the DNA evidence. Coates is facing a second, similar lawsuit that is pending in US District Court in Vermont. The Vermont Medical Practice Board permanently revoked Coates' medical license before the trial.
Medscape Physicians Behaving Badly: Stress and Hardship Trigger Misconduct
Physicians reveal how often they see fellow doctors misbehaving in person or on social media, and recount some of the worst physician behavior they have witnessed.Medscape Features Slideshows, Aug 2022
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Alicia Ault
Alicia Ault is a St. Petersburg, Florida-based freelance journalist whose work has appeared in publications including JAMA and Smithsonian.com. You can find her on Twitter @aliciaault.
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