Inset: Javaid Perwaiz (Western Tidewater Regional Jail). Background: Chesapeake Regional Medical Center in Virginia (WVEC/YouTube).
A Virginia hospital allowed a doctor to “routinely and knowingly” perform unnecessary surgeries “in order to increase its own revenue,” including instances where he performed C-sections and hysterectomies “without consent,” a new lawsuit says.
“The need for intensive neonatal care for the babies … delivered early was so common that CRMC neonatologists referred to it as the “Perwaiz special,'” the legal complaint alleges about former gynecologist Javaid Perwaiz. More than 500 women filed a lawsuit Monday in Virginia Circuit Court against the Chesapeake Regional Medical Center, where Perwaiz worked.
“Perwaiz’s routine of scheduling medically unnecessary early inductions for his patients, at times convenient for his schedule, was an ‘open secret’ in the CRMC Labor and Delivery Unit,” the complaint says. “Perwaiz routinely scheduled surgeries, including sterilization procedures, on an accelerated basis, without adhering to CRMC’s established standards, to reduce the likelihood that patients would change their minds about the surgeries.”
The plaintiffs include 510 patients that Perwaiz allegedly operated on, with their lawsuit naming multiple executives as defendants for not preventing what happened, according to the complaint. Perwaiz is currently serving a 59-year prison sentence for Medicaid fraud connected to the unnecessary operations by the U.S. Justice Department.
CRMC was indicted in January 2025, for health care fraud and conspiracy to defraud the United States and interfere with government function in connection with Perwaiz’s alleged actions and a fraudulent billing scheme that prosecutors said was directly related to him.
Perwaiz’s “unnecessary and medically unjustified obstetrics and gynecology procedures” were performed between January 2010 and November 2019. The lawsuit filed against CRMC and the DOJ’s indictment outline numerous accusations of wrongdoing, many of them being disturbingly similar.
“In January 2014, Perwaiz altered a consent form after a patient was under anesthesia so that he could perform a more invasive surgery,” the civil complaint says. “While the January 2014 patient agreed to an abdominal hysterectomy (a removal of the uterus and cervix through an incision in the abdomen), Perwaiz also performed a bilateral salpingo-oophorectomy (removal of the fallopian tubes and ovaries), which the patient stated before surgery she did not want.”
In November 2014, a patient allegedly reported to CRMC that Perwaiz had performed a hysterectomy on her for a purportedly “pre-cancerous lesion,” but she later learned the lesion will still present after the surgery.
CRMC medical records reflect that another patient told a nurse she believed she was having surgery to address an enlarged right ovary, but Perwaiz instead performed a hysterectomy on the patient and left her ovaries intact, according to the civil complaint.
A woman who received medical treatment from Perwaiz at CRMC from around 2009 to 2017 alleges that Perwaiz performed an “untimely, unnecessary and uninformed” C-section without her consent, which left the woman suffering from “life-threatening complications” after the delivery of her baby “due to scar tissue,” the complaint says. Perwaiz also allegedly performed multiple cystectomies on her without consent.
Another patient allegedly woke up to a shocking 4-inch scar after a laparoscopic surgery to remove “purported adhesions.”
In the DOJ indictment, prosecutors describe how one woman sued Perwaiz in 2014 after he “tricked her into having surgery by falsely telling her cancer was imminent.” Perwaiz allegedly converted her surgery to an abdominal hysterectomy without her consent and included false statements in her medical records to cover it up, the DOJ said.
Surgical nurses and staff tried speaking up about the surgeries, including one who wrote in a consent form, “I feel as though we performed an assault on the patient if she truly did not want to have her ovaries removed. This just really bothers me.”
Federal prosecutors said in the CRMC indictment that Perwaiz was known for buying “lavish gifts for friends, nurses, anesthesiologists and others” who assisted with his practice.
“From 2012 to 2019, his gifts also included a $200 gift card to a post-surgery nurse manager, a $200 check to a L&D nurse, a $500 check to his preferred surgical assistant, a $500 check to his preferred scrub technician, a $500 check to a perioperative nurse, and paying over $2,000 to fund the retirement party of a L&D nurse,” the DOJ noted.
The plaintiffs in the civil suit are seeking $10 million each from CRMC. The medical center did not respond to Law&Crime’s requests for comment on Thursday.
