A former Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center doctor who sued USC, alleging he lost his job in 2019 in retaliation for complaining that his supervisor was interfering with patient care, lost a round in court Tuesday as a judge ruled he must take his case before an arbitrator rather than a jury.
The complicated lawsuit includes allegations that the plaintiff doctor’s mentor tried to change the mind of a young, dying leukemia patient who requested comfort care for a peaceful death.
In granting USC’s motion to compel arbitration, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Stephen I. Goorvitch noted that Dr. Mojtaba Akhtari does not dispute that he signed an arbitration agreement as part of his employment with USC, but maintained that he had no choice but to do so.
That explanation, according to the judge, “fails because he proffers no real evidence … in support of his argument.”
Goorvitch also rejected Akhtari’s other grounds for denying USC’s motion and he put the case on hold pending the outcome of the arbitration.
Akhtari’s lawsuit was filed last April 29 and also names Dr. Preet Chaudhary as a defendant. The suit’s allegations include retaliation, defamation and false light invasion of privacy.
A USC representative previously issued a one-sentence statement, saying: “We believe the claims in the lawsuit are baseless.”
USC hired Akhtari as an associate professor of clinical medicine in July 2014 at an annual salary of $275,000 and assigned Chaudhary as his mentor, according to his suit, which says he excelled as a hematologist-oncologist and had a reputation as one of the most productive physicians at Norris who provided “world-class palliative care” and received the 2014-2015 Keck Faculty Teaching Award.
A month before Akhtari began working at USC, Chaudary was disciplined for interfering with and disrespecting patients’ right to choose their medical care, but he continued to engage in the same behavior after Akhtari was hired, the suit alleges.
“From the start of plaintiff’s employment at USC, he witnessed Chaudhary behaving inappropriately and unethically,” the complaint alleges.
While abroad in July 2014, Chaudhary communicated with Dr. James Shen about patients and gave medical orders even though he could not physically assess the patients’ needs, the suit alleges. He also changed a patient’s antibiotics by phone without notifying the attending doctor, according to the plaintiff.
Akhtari was on inpatient service at the time and asked Chaudhary to cease interfering with patient care because he was violating hospital rules and making matters unsafe for patients, but Chaudhary kept on doing so, the suit alleges.
In October 2014, a young patient with advanced acute lymphoblastic leukemia asked to be put on comfort care and allowed to die peacefully, but Chaudhary tried to convince the patient to reconsider and asked Akhtari to support his actions, according to the complaint.
Akhtari alleges that when he refused to side with Chaudhary, his mentor “threatened to interfere by communicating directly with the patient.”
Other nurses, a physician’s assistant and a social worker all supported the patient’s choice and asked Akhtari to intervene, according to the plaintiff’s court papers. To defuse the dispute, Akhtari says he drove to the hospital at 9 p.m. and enlisted the help of Dr. Stephanie Hall, Keck’s chief medical officer.
A physician’s assistant who also complained about Chaudhary’s alleged treatment of patients was fired shortly after doing so, according to the plaintiff.
Although Chaudhary was eventually barred from seeing patients for a year, the discipline “served as a catalyst for heightened harassment and abuse from Chaudhary toward physicians and patients alike,” the suit alleges.
The plaintiff alleges USC “willingly acceded to and assisted Chaudhary in his determination to bully the medical staff into accepting his interference, or to purge the medical staff of anyone who disagreed with his medical opinions….”
Akhtari was placed on leave in February 2019 after Chaudhary claimed the plaintiff wanted to use a particular drug for a patient without disclosing a professional relationship with the pharmaceutical company, according to the plaintiff’s court papers.
That same month, Akhtari wrote a complaint detailing Chaudhary’s alleged unprofessional behavior and retaliatory conduct, but matters “languished for months with no resolution,” according to the suit.
In June 2019, Akhtari received a letter stating that he was exonerated, but that same month, USC declined to renew the plaintiff’s contract and provided no reason for doing so, the suit says.
Akhtari alleges that USC offered him a “six-figure payment” in exchange for his silence about his frustrations, but he declined the offer.