New Haven — One day after their company lost a lucrative city contract due to fraud, nine out-of-town doctors ponied up $1,000 apiece to the mayoral campaign of frontrunner Toni Harp.
The donors work for Hamden-based Connecticut Orthopaedic Specialists. Their company took in around $800,000 this past fiscal year as authorized orthopaedic caregivers for New Haven government’s workers’ compensation plan, according to the city.
On July 25, city workers received a letter informing them that they could no longer go to doctors from that firm for treatment of work-related injuries under that plan.
The city canceled the outfit’s contract after one of its doctors, Patrick Ruwe, admitted to improper handling of a workers’ compensation case. Ruwe, who lives in Branford, had treated a public works employee for a shoulder injury. He authorized the employee to return to work on light duty for eight hours a day. Then he subsequently signed a form stating that the city should limit the employee to four to five hours of work a day. He signed the form after the employee requested it in order to work a second job, not because he actually needed the hourly restriction, Ruwe admitted. He admitted there was no medical reason for the restriction.
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