FWA Briefs

A multi-million dollar dental fraud scheme provides an example to the benefits of having fraud, waste, and abuse (FWA) protection. Click to learn more.

On May 19, 2021, the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPac) provided feedback to Congress regarding their opinions on the effectiveness of the overwhelming 200 healthcare policy changes that Congress and CMS instituted during the interval of January through July 2020, in response to the coronavirus public health emergency. Aside from the obvious and necessary benefits of these changes in response to the pandemic, MedPac raises concerns about the detrimental impact in the realm of fraud in healthcare: “…not all actors in the healthcare system are well-intentioned”.

Relaxed telehealth restrictions is a necessary step to limit potential COVID-19 exposure in physician offices in the emergency period. With this change, unfortunately, the US Justice Department estimates telehealth-related fraud has expanded significantly since early 2020 – approximated at 4.5 billion dollars.

During the pandemic, healthcare claim fraud prevails as new fraud schemes develop and adapt to the changes in healthcare guidelines enacted, so providers can continue to treat patients. Two major areas of FWA expansion during the pandemic include Telehealth and COVID-19-related laboratory testing add-on services.

Context4 Healthcare is thrilled to announce that our Medical Director Dr. Steve Nesnidal has earned certification as an Accredited Health Care Fraud Investigator (AHFI), an important healthcare anti-fraud professional designation from the National Health Care Anti-Fraud Association (NHCAA).