Fraud In Healthcare

1280 Words6 Pages
Anja Dinion Fraud in the Healthcare system “More than $60 billion in public and private healthcare spending was lost to fraud each year. That’s more than the net worth of America’s eight largest private foundations. And it’s 33 times the amount of money that Avatar- the highest-earning movie of all time has made at the box office” Attorney General Eric Holder, National Healthcare Summit. Rampant overbilling and defrauding of these programs costs taxpayers up to $40 billion a year with some figures ranging much higher. Some of the costliest frauds have been perpetrated by leading pharmaceutical companies, which have misled public healthcare programs about the actual cost of prescription drugs and conspired with doctors to systematically…show more content…
Fraud schemes may be carried out by individuals, companies, or groups of individuals. Most doctors, health care providers, suppliers, and private companies who work with Medicare are honest. However, there are a few who are not. The following are examples of possible Medicare fraud: A health care provider bills Medicare for services you never received. A supplier bills Medicare for equipment you never got. Someone uses another person’s Medicare card to get medical care, supplies, or equipment. Someone bills Medicare for home medical equipment after it has been returned. A company offers a Medicare drug plan that has not been approved by Medicare. A company uses false information to mislead you into joining a Medicare plan.…show more content…
(i-sight) There has also been a Use of new state-of-the-art technology to fight fraud. Investigators in the HHS Office of the Inspector General are implementing state-of-the-art, cutting edge technology to identify and analyze potential fraud with unprecedented speed and efficiency. (Levinson) Using this technology, federal law enforcement officials are completing in a matter of days analysis of electronic evidence that previously took months to analyze using traditional investigative
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