Insys founder found guilty of racketeering in connection with bribes to prescribe potent opioid spray. On past Monitor Monday programs, we have reported on John Kapoor, the former CEO of opioid giant Insys Therapeutics Inc., who has been under indictment since October 2018 for alleged violations of the Anti-Kickback Statute…

Healthcare system drops petition to the U.S. Supreme Court to challenge the constitutionality of the whistleblower provisions of the False Claims Act Last month, several media outlets reported that Intermountain Health, a Utah-based health system that operates 22 hospitals and dozens of group clinics, urgent care facilities, a home healthcare…

Allegations were made of kickbacks in the form of co-pay waivers. Late last month, US WorldMeds, a pharmaceutical manufacturer, agreed to pay the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) $17.5 million  to resolve two whistleblowers’ claims that it violated the False Claims Act (FCA) by paying kickbacks to patients and doctors…

CHS and Medhost have categorically denied all of the allegations in the complaint. As the use of electronic health records (EHRs) has expanded at a rapid pace, so too has the fraud associated with these systems. An EHR is a digital version, or database, of a patient’s paper charts. The…

Filing focuses on generic drug costs levied by pharmacies absorbed by the pharmacy giant. In 2013, J. Douglas Strauser, a pharmacist, filed a whistleblower lawsuit against Stephen L. LaFrance Holdings Inc. and Walgreens, alleging that they overcharged Medicaid for generic drugs by not giving the government the best price. Stephen…

Decision expected soon in the Providence lawsuit. As regular Monitor Monday listeners know, we have been closely tracking the progress of data analysis firm Integra Med Analytics’ whistleblower lawsuit against Providence Health and its consultant J.A. Thomas and Associates, Inc. (JATA), alleging a conspiracy between Providence and JATA to upcode…

Individual policyholders in Georgia launch a class-action lawsuit against Anthem for deceptive sales. Early last week, Frances Kirby and John David Marks, two individual policyholders from Cook County, Georgia, filed a class-action lawsuit in federal court in Atlanta against Anthem and Blue Cross Blue Shield of Georgia for allegedly misleading…

Not enough information in the public use databases to know that a claim is fraudulent. “In God we trust; all others bring data.” That is what the sign above my desk says, right next to my six-foot slide rule. I was pondering the truth behind this tongue-in-cheek saying when I…

Filing marks shift in nature of healthcare litigation of this nature. The whistleblower cases I report on for RACmonitor typically are brought by the quintessential whistleblower – a healthcare industry insider who has observed first-hand fraud perpetrated by his or her employer and who, having brought the matter to the…

Federal takedown is considered the largest healthcare fraud in history. The Department of Justice (DOJ) has charged hundreds of medical professionals in what was dubbed “the largest healthcare fraud takedown operation in American history.” The DOJ brought charges against 601 defendants (76 of whom are doctors) for their alleged participation…