Attorney General Sues Medical Equipment Firm
The Florida Attorney General's Office has filed suit against a Tampa firm that it said made and sold more than 1,000 pricey back-pain therapy machines to physicians nationwide through "false, deceptive or misleading advertising." Most of the doctors were chiropractors . According to Health News Florida, defendants are Axiom Worldwide, President and CEO James J. Gibson Jr. and Vice President Nicholas Exarhos. The complaint said they co-founded the company and both participated in unlawful sales practices.
Among other misleading statements, the complaint filed Nov. 19 in Hillsborough Circuit Court said, Axiom called its DRX 9000 spinal decompression system "the eighth wonder of the world."
Attorney General Bill McCollum seeks an injunction barring Axiom from continuing to market the machine under false pretenses and also seeks a court order forcing almost $100 million in repayment to consumers and the state - the amount that Axiom received for the machine in 2005 and 2006.
Gibson told Health News Florida this morning that he cannot comment on the suit because the company hasn't received it yet. A message seeking comment left with the company Tuesday evening by The Associated Press was not immediately returned. The DRX 9000 package that is at issue in the suit cost $95,000, or $125,000 if a neck attachment is included, the complaint said.
Among the false statements, the complaint said, were that Axiom had a patent on DRX 9000, that the system was "approved" by FDA, and that NASA engineers developed it through "space age technology."
The
chiropractors who bought the system were led to believe that Medicare and private insurers would cover the
treatments, when the defendants knew claims were being denied, the complaint said.
The company's Web site, https://axiomworldwide.com , was not in operation today, but information was available on a related site, www.AxiomPainSolutions.com.
There, the system was said to "provide relief of pain and symptoms associated with herniated discs, bulging or protruding discs, degenerative disc disease, posterior facet syndrome, and sciatica."
The site also offers videos of patient testimonials and a map of practitioners who use the DRX system. In Florida, there are 68 listed.
In July 2006, North American Medical Corp. sued Axiom for trademark infringement regarding DRX 9000, but Axiom kept making false claims, the attorney general's complaint said.
A federal district court in Georgia entered an injunction against Axiom and its executives in March 2007. A year later that injunction was vacated by an appellate court, but the findings of the lower court about the false claims were upheld.
In April of this year, nine chiropractors from other states sued Axiom, Gibson and Exarhos, saying they would never have bought the machines if they had known the truth.
Meanwhile, 11 Florida chiropractors have been fined by the state Board of Chiropractic Medicine for using the misleading marketing materials they received from Axiom.
The Attorney General's Office identified them as William LaBonte, of Ormond Beach; Manuel Carril, of Miami; Matthew Symons, of Royal Palm Beach; Sandra Hernandez, of Royal Palm Beach; Richard Rosen, of Boca Raton; Angelo Rubano, of Fort Myers; Joshua Smith, of Jupiter; Todd Bodanza, of Trinity; Brian Reimer, West Palm Beach; Fred Blumenfeld, West Palm Beach; and David Golinger, of Coral Springs.
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