POINT PLEASANT — Patients who had appointments with Dr. Mark Nolan over the past two weeks showed up to find a new doctor in his place and Nolan’s office staff gone.

Nolan, who has been a longtime OB/GYN in Mason County, works for Valley Health out of Huntington which has office space at Pleasant Valley Hospital, where Nolan also delivers babies.

Rumors of the shakeup at Nolan’s office began to spread throughout the community with a member of Nolan’s immediate office staff speaking publicly about the situation.

Kara Fetty, of Point Pleasant, says she’s been a medical assistant at Nolan’s office for over two years. She added she was only speaking for herself when addressing her version of what happened in the office of one of the most well known doctors in the area.

Fetty said to her knowledge Valley Health placed Nolan on a two-week paid leave as of Aug. 27, and she said the reasons for this leave are not clear. Fetty also said there were three people who ran Nolan’s office, including herself, another employee and Nolan’s wife Brenda. Fetty said Valley Health fired Brenda on Aug. 17 and then on Aug. 27, fired herself and the remaining employee. Fetty said there was no notice given for her termination, saying she had never been fired from a job before.

“They are an at-will employer, so they didn’t have to have a reason (about her termination) … so I asked them if I was getting fired for no reason, and they said yes,” Fetty said.

Fetty said she believes problems started between the Nolan office and Valley Health when the Nolan office notified Valley Health about tests that were done in Nolan’s office that were not getting billed under his provider number.

Once the shakeup happened last week, Fetty said she heard many untrue rumors flying around the community about why Nolan was gone. She said she especially found it troubling that people were saying he abandoned his patients. Fetty adamantly denies Nolan and his staff left voluntarily and said the situation “makes her sick” because she is genuinely concerned about those patients.

“Dr. Nolan is seeing patients now that he delivered … that’s how loyal they are to him,” Fetty said, saying she couldn’t imagine having the kind of trust a person must have in an OB/GYN and then find that person replaced without warning.

Nolan and his wife have not commented on the situation. According to Fetty, it was her understanding they had been advised by their attorney not to make any comments at this time.

Valley Health was contacted multiple times by the Point Pleasant Register and Gallipolis Daily Tribune about the situation but as of press time on Wednesday evening, there had been no response.