Quote:
Originally Posted by golfing eagles
These numbers are out of date, about 15 years ago, but at the time Medicare budget was $600 billion/year, fraud was estimated at $8 billion/year and the government was spending $12 billion/year to fight it, without success. If that were a private company and you were CEO, what would you do????
The sad part is that it should have only cost 1% of that to find the frauds----just print out a list of the highest Medicare billers that are not institutions and start there. Number one on the list was a Florida solo cardiologist who billed $55 million in one year. Who thinks that was legitimate?????
Really want to cut healthcare cost? Eliminate the continuing practice of defensive medicine that costs over $1 TRILLION/ year by eliminating runaway jury malpractice verdicts (or killing all the lawyers  ) |
There are too too many issues to list here. We’ve been chasing our tails for so long we don’t know where we originally wanted to go
First it was doctors who always sent you for an MRI at a company that they owned under another corporate name.
Therapists milking therapy sessions to the maximum that Medicare would pay
Nursing homes with different wings so facility and sundry expenses for private pay and VA pay could be bundled with Medicare costs
A lot of creative accounting. A lot of organizational gyrations to hide fraud and abuse.
I remember way back in the 80’s (?) when at Senate hearings testimony got uncomfortably close to opening up the nursing home industry to a deep dive investigation on how Medicare was paying non-Medicare related costs. Almost comical to see on tv how the questions were backpedaled. Almost an “aha” moment. No one seemed to want to go there. Lobbyists be dammned