Valeant Pharmaceuticals International Inc. refilled patients’ prescriptions without their permission and steered them to more expensive drugs in order to boost sales and profits, according to a lawsuit that sheds new light on the drug company’s secret operations.

T. Rowe Price Group Inc. sued Valeant and its top executives, using information from former employees to back its claims that the mutual fund giant was a victim of fraud. The former Valeant workers expand on previous disclosures about the Laval, Quebec-based company that has been the subject of criminal, congressional and regulatory investigations of how it shielded branded drugs from generic competition to inflate revenue and profit.

Employees cited in the lawsuit provided fresh insight into how the mail-order pharmacy Philidor Rx Services LLC helped Valeant hide cheaper generic versions of its drugs and channeled prescriptions to brand names. One pharmacy worker in Phoenix said Philidor had a group of 10 employees “devoted to calling patients to enroll them in the automatic refill program without their permission,” according to the complaint.

Philidor workers would leave messages for patients saying “if we don’t hear from you in 24 hours, we will process your refill,” according to the intake specialist cited in the complaint. The worker said people “were upset with this practice because regardless of whether or not the patient is billed, the refill is billed through their insurance and has an impact on a patient’s policies.”

Confidentiality Agreements

Secrecy was so important to the Valeant-Philidor relationship that the employees had to sign confidentiality agreements “empowering the pharmacy to sue workers who divulged information about its activities,” according to the complaint, which cited a patient care specialist.

Philidor’s internal policy also mandated that Valeant-branded drugs be dispensed, even if a prescription called for a generic, said an adjudication specialist cited in the complaint.

“Philidor told employees to always put ‘brand’ in Philidor’s computer system and to change the prescription in order to dispense a brand drug,” the specialist said. “Indeed, her supervisor told her that, ‘We do not dispense generics. You give them the brand drugs.”’

None of the employees cited in the complaint are named.

Alleghany Sues

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