NEW YORK, July 7 /PRNewswire/ -- In December of 2009, three New York City doctors were charged by the Staten Island District Attorneys Office with aiding a non-doctor in the practice of medicine and with filing false insurance claims for procedures they allegedly had not really preformed in their Staten Island office. The three doctors, pain management specialists Serge Menkin and Dima Rozen and anesthesiologist Varuzhan Dovlatyan, all worked out of the MediSpa medical office at 1454 Hylan Blvd. On June 28, 2010 the Staten Island Judge who presided over their criminal case dismissed all charges against Drs. Menkin and Dovlatyan after their lawyer, Alexander Novak of Cedarhurst, New York, requested the Judge review the Grand Jury proceedings and the DA's witnesses' statements. Novak argued in his papers and before the court that what the government's witnesses claimed to have occurred just did not violate any law. The Judge agreed.
The DA accused the doctors of allowing Eduard Belfer, a non-doctor and office manager of the Staten Island office, to be in the operating room and that he assisted the doctors in administering delicate injections of medication into patients' spinal columns and at the same time giving general anesthesia. Alexander Novak said, "It is inconceivable that any doctor let alone specialists like Menkin and Dovlatyan, who have never had any blemish on their record, would permit anyone but themselves to perform delicate procedures in front of them." He said, "The government's witnesses all who had received strong doses of general anesthesia before receiving the injections likely suffered from temporary amnesia which is a very common from the anesthesia." While it was true that Mr. Belfer walked the patient to the operating and was there by his side when he woke up from the anesthesia in the recovery room, it was the doctors who performed the medical procedures in the operating room. Since it was the doctors who performed the surgery, they had a right to charge the medical insurance carriers and so the charges of medical insurance had to be dropped as well.
Novak had hired a Medical School professor of anesthesiology who would have testified that doctors call this medication the 'milk of amnesia' because so many people have no recollection of being under its influence. "It is supposed to make you forget the pain of the injections," Novak said, "because without anesthesia those injections really hurt." The Judge agreed that the District Attorney did not present a sufficient case to the Grand Jury and all charges were dismissed against Menkin and Dovlatyan. The Staten Island District Attorneys Office said they did not expect to bring any other charges against the two doctors. Dr. Rozen, a Canadian doctor, never appeared for an arraignment is still at large, so the court did nothing with him. This closes a difficult chapter for the other two doctors who now feel vindicated of all wrong doings and still practice in Staten Island.
SOURCE Alexander Novak
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The DA accused the doctors of allowing Eduard Belfer, a non-doctor and office manager of the Staten Island office, to be in the operating room and that he assisted the doctors in administering delicate injections of medication into patients' spinal columns and at the same time giving general anesthesia. Alexander Novak said, "It is inconceivable that any doctor let alone specialists like Menkin and Dovlatyan, who have never had any blemish on their record, would permit anyone but themselves to perform delicate procedures in front of them." He said, "The government's witnesses all who had received strong doses of general anesthesia before receiving the injections likely suffered from temporary amnesia which is a very common from the anesthesia." While it was true that Mr. Belfer walked the patient to the operating and was there by his side when he woke up from the anesthesia in the recovery room, it was the doctors who performed the medical procedures in the operating room. Since it was the doctors who performed the surgery, they had a right to charge the medical insurance carriers and so the charges of medical insurance had to be dropped as well.
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Novak had hired a Medical School professor of anesthesiology who would have testified that doctors call this medication the 'milk of amnesia' because so many people have no recollection of being under its influence. "It is supposed to make you forget the pain of the injections," Novak said, "because without anesthesia those injections really hurt." The Judge agreed that the District Attorney did not present a sufficient case to the Grand Jury and all charges were dismissed against Menkin and Dovlatyan. The Staten Island District Attorneys Office said they did not expect to bring any other charges against the two doctors. Dr. Rozen, a Canadian doctor, never appeared for an arraignment is still at large, so the court did nothing with him. This closes a difficult chapter for the other two doctors who now feel vindicated of all wrong doings and still practice in Staten Island.
SOURCE Alexander Novak
