Kentucky doctor who gave up license but worked as a consultant admits illegal prescribing
A Kentucky doctor who had given up his license but worked as a consultant at clinic pleaded guilty to conspiracy to illegally distribute drugs.
Don V. Bryson, a 1979 graduate of the University of Kentucky College of Medicine, surrendered his license in 2012 after a consultant raised concerns about his prescribing practices, according the Kentucky Board of Medical Licensure.
However, he worked as a consultant for a company called The Talmadge Group Inc., which did business in Paintsville under the name Appalachian Family Medicine.
The clinic was in a building Bryson owned. He received rent for the space and a monthly payment for being a consultant, according to his plea agreement.
The business was not registered as a pain clinic, but significant numbers of the people who went there seeking prescriptions for opioid pain medication, the plea agreement says.
Much of the time it was open, the clinic didn’t have a full time medical provider, instead using temporary providers. There was a good deal of turnover because the clinic was issuing prescriptions “under circumstances that made the providers uncomfortable,” according to Bryson’s plea agreement.
Bryson and the owner of the business put limits on the providers’ medical decision-making, restricting or discouraging their ability to order drug tests and pill counts for patients, Bryson’s plea says.
Those are measures doctors can use to make sure patients are not misusing or selling drugs.
Bryson and the owner also discouraged providers at Appalachian Family Medicine from reducing the dosage of pain pills people received.
The plea agreement cited an example from September 2021 in which Bryson and the owner agreed to have a provider issue prescriptions under the name of another provider who had left.
The clinic issued prescriptions for a total of 6,915 pills from Sept. 6 to 9, 2021, in the name of the provider who wasn’t there, according to the plea deal.
The clinic owner is identified only as J.B in the court record. State records list Jeremy Talmadge Bryson as the incorporator and agent of The Talmadge Group Inc., which is no longer active.
The address for The Talmadge Group was the same as Don Bryson’s building on 10th Street in Paintsville.
In an earlier case, Bryson agreed in 2013 to pay the federal government $200,000 to settle allegations of improper billing to Medicare and Medicaid.
Federal authorities had alleged that between 2008 and December 2011, Bryson didn’t keep proper documentation for the bills he submitted to the federally funded programs.
In the current case, Bryson agreed to forfeit his office and agreed not to contest seizure of a 2020 Dodge Ram pickup truck and nearly $125,000.
The charge against Bryson is punishable by up to 20 years in prison. He is scheduled him to be sentenced in September.
