Medicare

March 8, 2021

Vascular surgeon Feng Qin and his medical practice Qin Medical P.C. will pay $800,000 to resolve civil claims and criminal charges that Qin performed procedures on end-stage renal disease patients that were not medically reasonable and necessary, and fraudulently billed Medicare.  Qin performed vascular access procedures on patients on a routine scheduled basis, without documenting the required clinical findings.  The government’s investigation was initiated by the filing of a qui tam complaint by Mark Favors.   USAO SDNY

March 5, 2021

A substance abuse treatment facility and two inpatient psychiatric hospitals in Ohio, along with their corporate parent, have agreed to pay $10.25 million to resolve claims under the Anti-Kickback Statute and False Claims Act.  According to DOJ, between 2013 and 2019, The Woods at Parkside, Cambridge Behavioral Hospital, and Ridgeview Behavioral Hospital—all owned by Florida-based Oglethorpe Inc.—allegedly provided improper inducements in the form of free long-distance transportation in order to entice patients to seek treatment at their facilities, and then submitted claims for services provided to those patients to Medicare.  The case was initiated by a former client advocate working at Cambridge, Darlene Baker.  DOJ; USAO SDOH

March 4, 2021

Alabama-based Heart Center Research, LLC has agreed to pay $1.1 million to settle allegations of receiving kickbacks from now-defunct Seattle-based medical testing company Natural Molecular Testing Corporation (NMTC) in exchange for referring patients for genetic testing.  In 2019, DOJ settled with three doctors and a medical practice also involved with the NMTC scheme, for $1.1 million.  USAO WDWA

March 3, 2021

The CEO of a group of medical providers in Michigan and Ohio has been sentenced to 15 years in prison and ordered to pay over $51 million in restitution to Medicare, as well as forfeit over $11.5 million in cash along with multiple properties and a Detroit Pistons season ticket membership, following a trial that found him guilty for his role in an extensive fraud scheme against Medicare.  Mashiyat Rashid, the CEO of Tri-County Wellness Group, allegedly instituted a corporate policy that forced patients—many of whom were addicted to opioids and recruited from homeless shelters and soup kitchens—to submit to medically unnecessary but highly reimbursed back injections in exchange for prescriptions to medically unnecessary opioids.  To implement the policy, Rashid made a point to hire physicians who were willing to put profit over patient care, further incentivizing them by offering to split reimbursements with them.  Yet according to trial testimony, many of the patients did not want, need, or benefit from the painful back injections, which left some of them suffering from adverse conditions, including open holes in their back.  Rashid is the second defendant to be sentenced in this case; twenty-one other defendants, including two physicians, have been convicted so far. DOJ

February 25, 2021

Following a self-disclosure to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in 2018, Bioventus, LLC has agreed to pay more than $3.6 million to resolve allegations of violating the False Claims Act in connection with sales of its Exogen ultrasonic bone growth stimulator device.  According to Bioventus, it discovered that its sales representatives sometimes improperly completed sections of certificates of medical necessity (CMN) that Medicare rules require be completed by treating physicians or physician offices.  USAO MDNC

February 19, 2021

Antonio Olivera, a hospice administrator in Southern California, has been sentenced to 2.5 years in prison and ordered to pay nearly $2.2 million in restitution for his role in a multimillion dollar fraud scheme that ran from 2011 to 2018.  Together with three co-conspirators, Olivera paid illegal kickbacks to patient recruiters for referrals of Medicare beneficiaries to the hospice, Mhiramarc Management LLC.  When Mhiramarc staffers realized the referrals did not qualify for hospice, Olivera overruled them and caused the referrals to be put on hospice, ultimately causing Medicare to pay over $17 million in false claims.  DOJ

February 12, 2021

The operator of Georgia-based durable medical equipment company Wilmington Island Medical Inc. has been sentenced to two years in prison and ordered to pay about $550,000 in restitution for paying kickbacks to doctors and nurse practitioners in exchange for signed orders and then billing those orders to Medicare.  The judgment against Patrick Wolfe is part of an ongoing investigation by the Southern District of Georgia to crack down on more than $1.5 billion in losses to Medicare and Medicaid originating from the district.  So far a total of thirty-one individuals and companies have been charged.  USAO SDGA