HOUSTON, Feb. 12, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Plaintiff’s counsel have filed an amended complaint in the antitrust class action challenging U.S. Anesthesia Partners’ (“USAP”) alleged monopolization of Texas anesthesia services; serial acquisitions of competing anesthesia providers; and price-fixing and market-allocation agreements between USAP and certain competitors. The case is now brought on behalf of Christy Burbage, a new named class representative whose claim is based on USAP overcharging her for anesthesia services she received in Plano, Texas. Since its original filing, the case has focused on alleged antitrust violations by USAP in connection with hospital-based anesthesia services. For certain claims, the amended complaint expands the putative class to include, in addition, patients who paid USAP for anesthesia services provided in non-hospital settings, typically called “ambulatory surgical centers.” Also, the amended complaint expands the putative class to include patients who paid for anesthesia provided by USAP not only in the Houston, Dallas-Fort Worth, and Austin areas, but anywhere in the State of Texas.
In a key August 2025 ruling, the federal court held that plaintiffs plausibly alleged USAP “exploited its leverage” through acquisitions and consolidation, resulting in artificially inflated prices and harm to patients statewide. The amended complaint builds on these allegations, asserting that USAP’s strategy involved acquiring anesthesia groups throughout Texas, raising prices, and leveraging market share in insurer negotiations. The amended complaint further identifies certain agreements by USAP that constituted price-fixing and market-division violations of the Sherman Antitrust Act.
The litigation occurs against a backdrop of rising medical costs and the financial pressures faced by patients, particularly in Texas, which has the nation’s highest rate of uninsured residents and was the primary focus of USAP’s allegedly unlawful “roll-up” scheme. The expanded complaint underscores how corporate consolidation has fueled these higher healthcare costs.
A related Federal Trade Commission case against USAP is also proceeding; the discovery period in that case has concluded any the parties are in the process of summary-judgment briefing.
Plaintiffs are represented by Barrett Reasoner, Brice Wilkinson, and Michael Davis of Gibbs & Bruns LLP; Kellie Lerner, Keagan Potts, and Harrison McAvoy of Shinder Cantor Lerner LLP; Kimberly A. Justice, Robert J. Wozniak, and Samantha M. Gupta of Freed Kanner London & Millen LLP; and Justin S. Nematzadeh of Nematzadeh PLLC.
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SOURCE Gibbs & Bruns LLP
