OIG Posts House Testimony on Health Care Fraud; 2 Audits
June 26th, 2009
Testimony was being presented June 25 by Daniel R. Levinson, Inspector General, before the Subcommittee on Health of the House Energy and Commerce Committee on Health Care Reform: Opportunities to Address Waste, Fraud and Abuse.
A small part of the written testimony:
Collaboration and innovation are essential in the fight against fraud. On May 20, 2009, HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and Attorney General Eric Holder announced a new initiative to marshal significant resources across the Government to prevent health care waste, fraud, and abuse; crack down on fraud perpetrators; and enhance existing partnerships between HHS and DOJ to reduce fraud and recover taxpayer dollars.
To further this effort, the Secretary and Attorney General created the Health Care Fraud Prevention and Enforcement Action Team (HEAT) joint task force consisting of senior level leadership from both departments. Among other activities, HEAT is building on the successful OIG-DOJ Medicare Fraud Strike Force initiated in south Florida, discussed in greater detail later, by expanding Strike Forces to other metropolitan areas across the country.
These Strike Forces use advanced data analysis techniques to identify criminals operating as health care providers and detect emerging or migrating fraud schemes. HEAT is also focusing on prevention strategies to combat health care fraud. For example, HEAT will expand a Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) demonstration project in south Florida that uses site visits to potential durable medical equipment (DME) suppliers to ensure that applicants are legitimate businesses, not criminals.
HEAT also plans to enlist health care providers in the fight against fraud by increasing training about program requirements and effective compliance measures that help ensure integrity of billing practices. Strike Force activities are one part of the Government’s enforcement efforts; OIG also works with our law enforcement partners to pursue other criminal cases as well as civil and administrative cases.
To get to the full statement
http://www.oig.hhs.gov/testimony/docs/2009/06252009_testimony_health_reform.pdf
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