On January 30, Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced a surge of Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agents and investigators over the coming month and a half, focused on pharmacies and prescribers who are dispensing unusual or disproportionate amounts of opioid drugs. The DEA will examine distribution and inventory data reported to the DEA by prescription drug manufacturers and distributors for “patterns” and “outliers” for further investigation.
On May 31, 2017, the US Department of Justice announced a Settlement Agreement under which eClinicalWorks, a vendor of electronic health record software, agreed to pay $155 million and enter into a five-year Corporate Integrity Agreement to resolve allegations that it caused its customers to submit false claims for Medicare and Medicaid meaningful use payments in violation of the False Claims Act.
The Electronic Health Records (EHR) Incentive Program run by Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) garnered attention again last week following the release of a report by the Office of Inspector General of the US Department of Health and Human Services (OIG) describing inappropriate payments to physicians under the program. The report follows on the heels of a high-profile settlement under the False Claims Act between the US Department of Justice and an EHR vendor related to certified electronic health record technology (CEHRT) used in the EHR Incentive Program (which we’ve previously discussed in-depth).
The OIG reviewed payments to 100 eligible professionals (EPs) who received EHR incentive payments between May 2011 and June 2014 and identified 14 inappropriate payments. OIG extrapolated the results of the review to the 250,470 total EPs who received incentive payments during that time period and estimated that CMS made approximately $729 million in inappropriate EHR incentive payments out of a total of just over $6 billion in such payments during the review period. (more…)
As one of the last states to retain highly restrictive (and arguably anti-competitive) telemedicine practice standards, health care providers, regulatory boards, technology companies, payors and other stakeholders have been actively monitoring Texas’ approach to telemedicine regulation and the related Teladoc case. Texas has eliminated its most restrictive requirement for delivering care via telemedicine in Texas, increasing opportunities for providers to reach patients using technology. Senate Bill 1107 was passed on May 11, 2017, and the House added an amendment in passing Senate Bill 1107, which was approved in the Senate on May 18. The bill was signed into law by Governor Abbott last weekend.
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