Something Old, Something New (Hellacious Health Fraud (VI))

 

Here are a couple of recent cases that caught my eye. First, the old style of health care fraud:

• Evergreen Hospice, LLC (Evergreen), a hospice company located in Tulsa, Oklahoma, appears to be a Mom & Pop operation that advertises a Servant Attitude ("We are givers, not takers. We are listeners, not talkers. We are promoters of others and will perform our roles with humility and dignity") and touts their institutional commit to Ethics ("We will not participate in or tolerate dishonesty or unethical behavior"). On June 29 DOJ announced that Evergreen agreed to pay $48,830.70 to resolve allegations that it violated the False Claims Act by knowingly submitting false claims to Medicare for hospice care provided to beneficiaries who were not terminally ill. Medicare's hospice program requires a physician's certification that the patient/beneficiary is terminally ill, i.e., will probably die within 6 months. The settlement announcement included the usual boilerplate that liability was not established. The U.S. Attorney's announcement added: "'Unfortunately, some healthcare providers seek to defraud Medicare by billing unnecessary hospice services. Left unchecked, this misconduct would deplete funds available for terminally ill patients desperately in need of the relief that hospice care provides."

And something new(-ish):

• A key feature of 2010's Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA, ACA, or Obamacare) offered state governments a deal. It was well known that many states had substantial populations of individuals who were not old enough to qualify for Medicare and had too much income to qualify for Medicaid. (States get to establish the eligibility criteria for Medicaid and some, like mine, disqualify individuals at a ridiculously low income level.) The federal government's offer: cap your eligibility at 133% of the federal poverty level (effectively 138% of FPL after accounting for the 5% income disregard feature of Medicaid) and we will pay 100% of the cost of expanded coverage for the first few years, 95% for the next few years, and 90% from then on. In return, states (including California) agreed that at least 85% of the services provided to the expanded population would be for "allowed medical expenses." Shortfalls would need to be returned to the state and ultimately to the U.S.

The four defendants in this case are [1] a county organized health system (COHS) that contracts to arrange for the provision of health care services under California’s Medicaid program (Medi-Cal) in Santa Barbara County and San Luis Obispo County, California; [2] a not-for-profit hospital network operating in Santa Barbara County; [3] a non-profit outpatient clinic operating in Santa Barbara County; and  [4] a non-profit community health center operating in Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo Counties. The four allegedly violated the False Claims Acts (state and federal) by falsely certifying that they met the 85% minimum from 2014-16. The net result was that Medicaid expansion funds were used to subsidize non-Medicaid services. 

The four defendants settled the suit for $68 million, of which $12.58 million will go to the whistleblower, the former medical director of the COHC.