WASHINGTON (AP) — Federal agents on Tuesday broke up a billion dollar Medicare scam that peddled unneeded orthopedic braces to hundreds of thousands of seniors. Two dozen people were charged, including doctors accused of writing bogus prescriptions.
The Justice Department said the scheme relied on overseas call centers to pry Medicare numbers from beneficiaries. Authorities also announced charges against owners of call centers, telemedicine firms and medical equipment companies that shipped unneeded back, shoulder, wrist and knee braces.
"The telemedicine we are talking about is basically a tele-scam," said Gary Cantrell, who oversees fraud investigations for the HHS inspector general's office."We are not talking about the use of advanced technology to provide better access to care." After verifying Medicare coverage, the seniors would be transferred to telemedicine companies for consultations with doctors, who wrote prescriptions for orthopedic braces, regardless of whether the patients needed them or not. Sometimes the same patient would get several braces.
"The breadth of this nationwide conspiracy should be frightening to all who rely on some form of health care," IRS criminal investigations chief Don Fort said in a statement."The conspiracy ... details broad corruption, massive amounts of greed and systemic flaws in our health care system that were exploited by the defendants."
Health care fraud is a pervasive problem that costs taxpayers tens of billions of dollars a year. The true extent of it is unknown, and some cases involve gray areas of complex payment policies. Officials said the government has options to recoup at least some of the money lost to Medicare, including seizing fraudsters' assets and accounts, as well as property purchased with the proceeds of the scam.
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