Scott T. Singstock, D.D.S.
Outcome
Dentist Scott T. Singstock paid $200,000, surrendered his DEA registration, and accepted a five-year restriction on applying for a new DEA registration after the government alleged he wrote numerous opioid prescriptions without a legitimate medical purpose and for individuals with whom he had no bona fide doctor-patient relationship.
Details
Scott T. Singstock, D.D.S. — Illegitimate Opioid Prescribing Outside Doctor-Patient Relationships (2020)
Outcome: Dentist Scott T. Singstock paid $200,000, surrendered his DEA registration, and accepted a five-year restriction on applying for a new DEA registration after the government alleged he wrote numerous opioid prescriptions without a legitimate medical purpose and for individuals with whom he had no bona fide doctor-patient relationship.
Scott T. Singstock, D.D.S., operated a dental practice in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The federal investigation of his prescribing practices was conducted by the DEA in the Western District of Michigan.
The government alleged that Dr. Singstock wrote numerous prescriptions for controlled substances — the majority of which were opioids — without a legitimate medical purpose and outside of the usual course of professional dental practice. Significantly, the allegations specified that many of these prescriptions were written for individuals with whom Dr. Singstock had no bona fide doctor-patient relationship and for whom no medical records existed.
Under the Controlled Substances Act and DEA implementing regulations, a practitioner may only prescribe controlled substances for a legitimate medical purpose in the usual course of professional practice. Writing prescriptions outside a legitimate doctor-patient relationship, without clinical documentation, violates both the CSA and the standard of professional practice.
The civil settlement was announced June 5, 2020, by U.S. Attorney Andrew B. Birge of the Western District of Michigan. Dr. Singstock paid $200,000 to resolve all civil allegations. As part of the settlement, he also surrendered his DEA registration authorizing him to prescribe controlled substances and agreed to a five-year restriction on his ability to apply for a new DEA registration — effectively ending his ability to prescribe controlled substances for at least five years.
Primary Source: Grand Rapids Dentist To Pay $200,000 To Resolve Allegations Of Illegitimate Controlled Substance Prescribing — DOJ Western District of Michigan
How Crucible Prevents This
Crucible's prescribing controls enforce documentation requirements for each controlled substance prescription, including verified patient identity, active treatment record, and legitimate clinical indication. Prescriptions written for individuals without an active patient record would trigger immediate alerts and mandatory review. The pattern of writing prescriptions outside any doctor-patient relationship — the core allegation here — would be detectable through patient record cross-referencing before prescriptions reach the DEA's prescribing data. Crucible's DEA registration compliance tracking would flag the surrender event and automatically initiate successor credentialing protocols.
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