February 2024    

Michigan resident Bri Jackson was involuntary detained in the psychiatric ward of Pontiac General Hospital for nine days after she had innocently tried to get her prescription for anti-depressants filled.

     Reporter Heather Catallo of WXYZ TV conducted the investigation into Bri Jackson’s case and in doing so turned up seven other official complaints of similar involuntary incarceration at local psychiatric facilities under the watch of psychiatrist Dr. Nagy Kheir.

     Bri has a law degree, but after losing her job and her health insurance, she was approved for Medicare coverage in the fall of 2023. She went to her regular physician to update her prescription for her depression now that she could afford it again — but he said she needed to go to the ER of Ascension Providence Hospital and have the psychiatrist at their psych unit write her prescription renewal.

     Once she arrived at the ER psych unit, Bri was never able to see a psychiatrist, she was not allowed to make any phone calls to her relatives, and she was told she could not leave. This went on for three days.

     She told them that she felt sad, but the Petition for Mental Health Treatment – a legal form used to involuntarily commit someone — diagnosed her with “suicidal ideation.” She told them she was definitely not suicidal, just depressed. The Clinical Certificate that was also filled out then listed her condition as “Psychosis” and was signed by a psychiatric doctor there, who may have only been an intern and who she never saw.

     Next she was involuntarily transferred to the psychiatric ward at Pontiac General Hospital and told to sign a form that would legally permit her to be voluntarily committed. She was threatened that they would submit the Petition and Certificate they had to the court to involuntarily commit her if she didn’t “sign in” voluntarily. She did.

     Nine days and $9700.00 of Medicare payments to to the hospital later, she was released. She had been told she was being treated for “depression” while she was there, but her release paperwork listed her condition as “Bipolar.” It was signed by Dr. Kheir, apparently to conform to the diagnosis necessary to receive the Medicare payments.

     Until this KXYZ TV story broke, Dr. Kheir was the head psychiatrist at the hospital, but he resigned after Heather Catallo had started her investigation.

     Among other things, she discovered that since 2017 Pontiac General through the Oakland Community Health Network had received almost $25,000,000 in Medicare payments for mental health services there. That included more than $6,700,000 for “Bipolar Diagnosis” patients and more than $14,000,000 for patients with a “Psychosis” diagnosis.

     She also discovered a file of Certificates pre-signed by Dr. Kheir to expedite the process of what would often become an involuntary commitment of a pateint.
Seven complaints against Dr. Kheir from similarly coerced patients had been formally filed since 2013 and reviewed by a local board of psychiatrists, but they declined to pursue any further investigation or to issue any penalties for all but one of the complaints. In 2021 a Michigan state Administrative Law Judge ruled that Dr. Kheir did violate the public health code for failing to spend more than ten minutes with one other patient for his diagnosis.

     The use of the court system, or the threat of using it, to involuntarily commit a patient, inaccurately diagnosis them with a severe enough condition to qualify for Medicare payments, and possibly also prescribe them psychotropic medications they do not need is probably not unique to this Pontiac Michigan institution.

     The damage done to an individual through a process such as this, which is also an utter violation of their civil rights, is one more psych crime that too often remains under normal investigatory radar because its victims have become too frightened – understandably – to speak up.

     Bri Jackson’s case is one more example of “prescriptions for profit,” in this case paid for by the U.S. taxpayer at a rate of $880 to $990 per day by Medicare.