Just The News: A California health care firm whose executives and employees donated big to Joe Biden and other Democrats has agreed to pay a $90 million civil penalty to settle allegations it bilked Medicare by filing paperwork to make patients look sicker than they were.
The penalty was one of the largest ever reached in a case involving Medicare Part C fraud, government officials said.
Sutter Health, headquartered in Sacramento, Calif., agreed to pay the fine and enter into a corporate integrity monitoring agreement with the government for five years to resolve allegations it violated the False Claims Act by knowingly submitting inaccurate diagnosis codes for Medicare Advantage patients, the Justice Department announced Tuesday.
DOJ alleged that Sutter Health “knowingly submitted unsupported diagnosis codes for certain patient encounters” that “caused inflated payments to be made to the plans and to Sutter Health,” and it then failed to take corrective action after being alerted to the problems.
“The government relies on health care providers, including those furnishing services to Medicare Part C beneficiaries, to submit accurate information to ensure proper payment,” Deputy Assistant Attorney General Sarah Harrington said in announcing the penalty. “Today’s result sends a clear message that we will hold health care providers responsible if they knowingly provide or fail to correct information that is untruthful.” more
It looks like they didn’t give ENOUGH to Zombie Joe.
Is it any wonder people don’t trust health info from big pharma, media and govt?
It’s all about money and power.
Well, there goes the BIG Guy’s 10% out the window.
The money will now be transferred to the Taliban for infrastructure projects.
Only 90 million? huh
Big meh.
This is like telling thieves to give back some of what they stole.
Woo hoo. What a penalty.