Kwasi Gyambibi, a former University of Connecticut-Stamford employee, has been found guilty by a federal grand jury in New Haven of health care fraud offenses.
As previously reported, Gyambibi and his wife Kakra Gyambibi ”“ a doctor who worked at Stamford Hospital ”“ were accused of engaging in a scheme designed to prescribe expensive, medically unnecessary compounded medications to those enrolled in the state employee pharmacy benefit plan.
On Jan. 9, a grand jury in New Haven returned a 19-count indictment alleging that in 2014 and 2015 the Gyambibis”™ scheme defrauded the state of Connecticut Pharmacy Benefit Plan, TRICARE and other health care programs by submitting prescriptions for compound pharmacy medications prepared and dispensed by Advantage Pharmacy.
Advantage was a compounding pharmacy in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. It created compound prescription drugs specifically tailored for individual patients who had a medical need for a compound drug by mixing together individual ingredients in the exact strength and dosage prescribed by the health care provider to meet the unique needs of a patient.
One tube of a compound drug cream prepared and dispensed by Advantage Pharmacy typically cost health care benefit programs thousands of dollars, and some individual tubes of cream cost more than $11,000 for a one-month supply. Kwasi Gyambibi acted as, and eventually became, a sales representative for Advantage Pharmacy.
According to the grand jury indictment, although the prescriptions sent to Advantage Pharmacy contained Kakra Gyambibi”™s signature, she did not treat, examine or even meet with the patients for whom the prescriptions were written. Based on those false and misleading claims, the victim health care programs paid Advantage Pharmacy for the compound prescription drugs.
Advantage Pharmacy in tum paid commissions of 15 percent to 35 percent to sales representatives, including Kwasi Gyambibi”™s cousin.
It is alleged that Kwasi and Kakra Gyambibi also induced the victim health care programs to pay Advantage Pharmacy more than $292,000 for their own compound prescription drugs.
The investigation revealed that the scheme resulted in more than $1.5 million in losses to the victim health care programs.
The jury found Kwasi Gyambibi guilty on Feb. 22 of two counts of health care fraud related to fraudulent prescriptions for compound drugs that were submitted to Advantage Pharmacy in March 2015, and found him not guilty of seven counts of health care fraud. The jury could not reach a verdict on the other 10 counts in the indictment.
U.S. District Judge Jeffrey A. Meyer has scheduled sentencing for May 28, at which time Kwasi Gyambibi faces a maximum term of imprisonment of 20 years.
On Jan. 18, Kakra Gyambibi pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit health care fraud. She also awaits sentencing.
