Dr. Joseph Lamelas Lawsuit: Patient Harm, Medicare, and $15M Settlement

The lawsuit involving Dr. Joseph Lamelas was a federal False Claims Act case alleging that he and two fellow cardiac surgeons at Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center in Houston routinely ran overlapping heart operations, left critical portions to residents, and billed Medicare as though they had been present for each surgery in full. It ended on June 24, 2024, when Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center, Baylor College of Medicine, and Surgical Associates of Texas P.A. agreed to pay $15 million to resolve the claims. No individual surgeon, including Lamelas, was found liable, and the institutions denied wrongdoing.¹

What the Lawsuit Alleged

The case started as a sealed qui tam complaint filed on August 7, 2019 by Dr. Jeffrey Morgan, a former director of the transplant program at Baylor College of Medicine.²¹³

The government’s specific claims were these. The surgeons allegedly left critical portions of complex heart operations, including coronary artery bypass grafts, valve repairs, and aortic procedures, to residents and fellows who were not qualified to perform them independently. They allegedly signed documentation attesting that they were present for the “entire” operation when they had actually stepped out to begin or continue another case. They allegedly skipped the required surgical “timeout,” the procedural pause during which staff verify patient identity and review risks, and started additional operations without designating a backup surgeon. And patients were allegedly never told that their lead surgeon would leave partway through to work on someone else.¹⁴⁵

The whistleblower’s complaint described a system driven by volume. The three surgeons’ caseloads were alleged to run two to four times the national average, generating about $150 million in hospital revenue and earning them compensation packages above $2 million a year, roughly four times the Houston specialty average.⁶ A pay-per-procedure structure allegedly rewarded high-volume scheduling. As one example, the lawsuit alleged that in 2018, Dr. Coselli was booked for more than 32 hours of surgery within a single 16-hour span.³

Alleged Patient Harm

According to the Houston Chronicle’s reporting on the complaint, the concurrent scheduling led to patients being kept under anesthesia longer than necessary, excessive internal bleeding that forced surgeons to reopen patients’ chests, and heart valve sutures coming loose and requiring repeat operations. The complaint also cited an internal review that identified at least four patient deaths under Dr. Ott’s care during overlapping surgeries.³

The institutions rejected those characterizations. Baylor College of Medicine’s general counsel, Robert Corrigan Jr., said “no patients were harmed.”⁴ Dr. Ott said, “We have proven, using hospital records and operating room timelines, that I was in the operating rooms and did the operations that I claimed.”³

What Medicare Rules Actually Allow

Concurrent surgery is not, by itself, prohibited. A teaching surgeon may bill Medicare for two overlapping procedures if the surgeon is physically present for all “critical and key portions” of both, and those critical portions do not happen at the same time. Once the critical phase of one operation ends, the surgeon may move to the second room. During non-critical phases, the teaching surgeon must remain immediately available or hand off to another qualified surgeon.⁷

Three simultaneous procedures are treated differently. CMS considers the surgeon’s role in that situation supervisory rather than a direct physician service, and the surgeon cannot bill Medicare for those cases at all.⁷ The government alleged that the Baylor surgeons crossed both lines.

The $15 Million Settlement

On June 24, 2024, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Texas announced that Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center, Baylor College of Medicine, and Surgical Associates of Texas P.A. had agreed to pay $15 million to resolve the case. The Justice Department called it the largest settlement to date involving concurrent surgery allegations. Morgan, the whistleblower, received $3,075,000 of the recovery under the False Claims Act’s qui tam provisions.¹

U.S. Attorney Alamdar S. Hamdani said the surgeons “often ran two operating rooms at once and failed to attend the surgical ‘timeout,'” while officials from the Department of Health and Human Services and the FBI called the practices “gambling with their patients’ care.”⁸

None of the individual surgeons, including Lamelas, were found liable, and the institutions denied wrongdoing. Baylor St. Luke’s described the agreement as a resolution of a “documentation and billing matter involving compliance and billing requirements” and said it “remains committed to complying with all CMS regulations.”⁴ Baylor College of Medicine’s general counsel stated the school “did not engage in conduct that violates any applicable federal law or regulation.”⁸

Where Lamelas Is Now

Lamelas had already left Baylor for the University of Miami in early 2019, before the whistleblower suit was filed, becoming chief of cardiothoracic surgery and professor of surgery at the Miller School of Medicine.⁹⁶¹⁰

His scheduling drew renewed attention in August 2025. Michael Davis, a 71-year-old heart patient, was the fourth person booked for surgery by Lamelas on August 29. A complication with the second patient led to Davis’s operation being canceled around 5 p.m. after he had fasted since 9:30 that morning. His wife, Donna Davis, filed a four-page complaint about poor communication and a 12-day gap before anyone from the hospital followed up. UHealth’s Office of Patient Experience apologized for the communication failures and waived the $300 bill for Davis’s pre-surgery tests, though the hospital called the cancellation an “appropriate decision” made within “established clinical protocols” and said the incident “prompted renewed discussion among our leadership about how best to minimize disruption to patients’ surgical experiences.”¹⁰

Lamelas left the University of Miami in late 2025 and joined the NCH Rooney Heart Institute in Naples, Florida, where he began accepting patients on October 13, 2025. He now serves as Director of the Minimally Invasive Heart Center and remains professionally active.¹¹¹²

1
U.S. Department of Justice. Texas Medical Center Institutions Agree to Pay $15M Record Settlement Involving Concurrent Billing Claims for Critical Surgeries
2
CourtListener. Morgan v. Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center
3
Houston Chronicle. Federal Whistleblower Lawsuit Details Baylor St. Luke’s Concurrent Surgeries
4
Houston Public Media. Federal Investigation Determines Houston Surgeons Delegated Advanced Heart Surgery Procedures to Residents
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BMJ. Baylor College of Medicine Settlement Over Concurrent Surgeries
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Miami Herald. Baylor College of Medicine Settles Concurrent Surgery Allegations
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Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. CMS Transmittal on Teaching Physician Billing Requirements
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Medscape. Baylor Heart Surgeons Pay $15 Mil to Settle Federal Charges Over Concurrent Surgeries
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University of Miami Miller School of Medicine. University of Miami Welcomes Joseph Lamelas
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Miami Herald. Heart Patient Surgery Canceled at UHealth After Scheduling Issues
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NCH Healthcare System. Dr. Joseph Lamelas, MD
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Doximity. Joseph Lamelas, MD