Ozone Gas Injections at Healing Hands of Virginia: What Patients of Dr. Jawad Bhatti Should Know

Jawad Bhatti, 54, of Richmond, Virginia, owned and operated a pain-management clinic called Healing Hands of Virginia. In 2025 a federal grand jury in the Eastern District of Virginia charged him with 26 counts tied to his use of ozone gas on patients. The case is United States v. Jawad Bhatti, Criminal No. 3:25-cr-00099, in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Richmond Division.

According to the indictment and the U.S. Attorney's Office, Bhatti bought ozone-generating machines from suppliers in Germany and Hong Kong, used them to make ozone gas, combined that gas with the anesthetic lidocaine, and injected the mixture into patients. He then billed Medicare and Medicaid for the injections by calling them nerve blocks or steroid injections, which they were not, and by claiming he had used ultrasound or radiological guidance that prosecutors say he did not use.

The charges include health care fraud, false statements related to health care matters, receiving adulterated and misbranded devices, and causing a drug to be misbranded. Two of the counts were later dismissed. The core of the case is simple to state: patients were given an unapproved substance, many did not know it, and the government programs that paid for the care were billed under codes that hid what actually happened.

Ozone is a gas. Some alternative-medicine practitioners promote injecting or infusing it as a treatment for pain and a long list of diseases, but mainstream medicine does not accept those claims, and the FDA has not approved ozone for use inside the body as a therapy.

The FDA's position is blunt. The agency describes ozone as a "toxic gas with no known useful medical application in specific, adjunctive or preventive therapy," and states that for ozone to work as a germicide "it must be present in a concentration far greater than that which can be safely tolerated by man and animals." The agency has also warned that exposure can cause undesirable effects on the central nervous system, the heart, and vision, and can irritate the lungs.

According to reporting by the Richmond Times-Dispatch, the companies that sold Bhatti the machines attached a disclaimer to the sale. The buyer had to acknowledge that the device "is not a medical device," would not be represented as one, and does not treat or cure any disease. Prosecutors say Bhatti's clinic website nonetheless advertised ozone as a pain therapy and, at points, described it as a treatment for cancer, AIDS, and arthritis. None of those uses is supported by mainstream science.

The physical accounts in this case are hard to read. Prosecutors say Bhatti injected the ozone mixture into patients' necks, backs, toes, and scalps, and that many described it as the worst pain they had ever felt. According to reporting on the case by WRIC and other Richmond outlets, patients reported extreme pain at the injection sites and symptoms that ranged from seizures and vomiting to migraines and temporary loss of vision.

Bhatti's own signed statement of facts, filed with the court as part of the February 2026 plea, acknowledged that the injections often caused physical side effects in his patients. It also acknowledged that he often gave the ozone compound without securing the patient's informed knowledge and consent, and that he was aware the use of ozone for medical purposes was not approved by the FDA.

Those admissions are on the record in a court document. They matter because a patient who was harmed does not have to prove from scratch that the treatment was improper. Much of that groundwork already sits in the federal file.

Two facts in this case are especially important for patients, and they work together. The first is consent. A patient has the right to know what is being put into their body and to agree to it. When a provider injects an unapproved substance and does not tell the patient what it is, that is not a technical paperwork problem. It goes to the heart of what the law calls informed consent, a subject we cover in our article on understanding medical malpractice and your rights as a patient.

The second fact is concealment. According to prosecutors and Bhatti's statement of facts, the ozone injections were not recorded honestly. Bhatti used false billing codes and did not identify the ozone in patients' records, which is part of why the conduct went undetected for so long. That creates a painful situation for former patients: you may have been injected with ozone and have no note in your chart that says so.

This is exactly the kind of case where the hidden layer of the medical record matters. Timestamps, order entries, billing codes, and the metadata behind an electronic chart can show what was really given and when, even when the visible note is silent or misleading. Our article on EMR audit trails and what electronic records actually reveal explains how that hidden layer works and why it is worth demanding in writing.

The government also treated this as a fraud case, because the injections were billed to public health programs under codes for services that were never provided. According to the indictment, Bhatti billed Medicare and Medicaid more than five million dollars in connection with the scheme and was paid a fraction of that amount. The indictment sought forfeiture of $1,206,690, described as the gross proceeds of the charged offenses.

The indictment breaks the billing down. For one group of counts it alleges Bhatti fraudulently billed the programs $1,941,204.32 and was paid $465,352.54. For another group it alleges he billed $3,261,170.64 and was paid $741,338.38. The billing codes told the programs he had delivered legitimate nerve blocks and steroid injections with imaging guidance. Prosecutors say what patients actually received was ozone.

For an injured patient, the fraud numbers are context rather than the claim itself. A criminal fraud charge is about money owed to Medicare and Medicaid. A patient's own injury is a separate matter with its own path, which is the point we turn to next.

It is easy to assume that a federal prosecution takes care of the people who were hurt. It usually does not. A criminal case can send someone to prison and can order restitution, but the restitution in this matter was tied to the money defrauded from Medicare and Medicaid, not to what individual patients lost in pain, lasting injury, or the cost of undoing the harm. A patient who wants to be compensated for a personal injury generally has to bring a separate civil claim.

In Virginia, a claim like this would usually be a medical malpractice or medical battery claim. Being injected with an unapproved substance without consent can support a claim built on lack of informed consent, on treatment that fell below the accepted standard of care, or on a battery theory, depending on the facts. A civil claim has a different job than the criminal case, a lower burden of proof, and a different clock, which is the part patients most often get wrong.

The two tracks can help each other. The federal file, including the indictment, the statement of facts, and any records the government gathered, becomes a roadmap for a civil claim. But a civil claim still has to be brought by the patient, and it has to be brought in time.

If you or a family member was treated at Healing Hands of Virginia, especially between 2019 and 2023, start by getting the records. Federal law gives patients and their representatives the right to inspect and copy the medical record, so request the complete file in writing: office notes, procedure and injection records, the medication list, billing and coding records, and any imaging. Ask specifically for the electronic record and its audit trail, not just a printed summary.

Do not assume your chart tells the whole story. Because prosecutors say the ozone was billed under other codes and left out of the notes, the visible record may not mention ozone at all. That is a reason to look harder, not a reason to walk away. If you remember an injection that caused unusual pain, seizures, vomiting, vision problems, or other symptoms after a visit to this clinic, write down what you recall while it is fresh, including dates, what you were told, and who was present.

You can also check the clinic and the provider through public records. The Virginia Board of Medicine keeps an online license lookup, and our guide on how to check a surgeon's disciplinary record before surgery walks through how to read a physician's license file and any board actions. If you are helping an older relative who was a patient, gather their records and their account too.