Patient Says Doctor & Clinic Went Wild| Misdiagnosing Patients With Lyme Disease

INDEPENDENCE, Mo. (CN) - A woman claims Dr. Carol Ryser, of the Health Centers of America-Kansas City, charged thousands of dollars to treat her for nearly a year for Lyme disease and a long list of other diseases, none of which she had. She claims Michael Ryser, CEO of the Health Centers, "trained the employees of HCAKC how to sell HCAKC's unnecessary services to patients, how to convince people that they have Lyme disease and need treatment."

Plaintiff Candace Anthony claims the defendants "prey on the sick". She claims Michael Ryser "has told HCAKC employees that they are 'actors' and that they have a 'script to play with patients.'" She claims that "For years Carol Ann Ryser has diagnosed many of not most of the patients of HCAKC with Lyme disease," but that "almost none of defendants' patients actually have, or ever had, Lyme disease."

Anthony claims that on April 28 the Kansas State Board of Healing Arts initiated proceedings to suspend, censure or revoke Dr. Ryser's license "as a result of the medical diagnosis and treatment provided to eleven separate patients consistent with the medical diagnosis and treatment provided to Candace Anthony."

Anthony claims that on Feb. 20, 2008, HKAKC employees drew more than 40 vials of blood from her. She says that though "Dr. Ryser did not perform a physical examination or touch (her)," Ryser diagnosed her as having "21 separate disorders, including Lymes disease (sic), hypercoagulation, disease of the central nervous system, beta strep, chronic bronchitis, chronic sinusitis, leucopenia, chronic fatigue syndrome, systemic candidiasis, insomnia, corticoadrenal insufficiency, depression, generalized anxiety disorder, Raynaud's syndrome, hyperinsulemia, fibromyalgia, urinary tract infection, proteinuria, tremors, general symptoms of memory loss, and nutritional deficiency ... whooping cough, elevated triglycerides, parvovirus, iodine deficiency, vitamin B deficiency, heavy metal and bromide toxicity, Bell's palsy, and other diseases and disorders."

Anthony claims the treatment and drugs the Rysers sold her caused her to suffer "increased pain, anxiety, fatigue, sickness and a change of mental status". She said she went to an emergency room on Jan. 1, 2009, and was told she suffered from hyperthyroidism, not Lyme disease. She says ER doctors told her to stop taking all the drugs the Rysers had sold and prescribed, and "informed her that she did not have Lyme disease and had undergone months of unnecessary treatment."

She demands punitive damages for fraud, medical negligence, fraudulent misrepresentation and concealment, violation of the Missouri Medical Merchandise Practices Act.

Anthony is represented in Jackson County Court by Lance Baughman of Wright, Green & Baumann of Lee's Summit, Mo.

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