Florida: According to the US Department of Justice, a federal jury in the Southern District of Florida found a Georgian man guilty of participating in a scheme to defraud Medicare by filing more than $463 million in claims for genetic and other laboratory testing (DOJ).
Not only were the tests not needed, but they were also procured through the payment of kickbacks. According to court documents and evidence presented at trial, Minal Patel of Atlanta owned LabSolutions, which performed the genetic tests.
DOJ alleged that Patel conspired with patient brokers, telemedicine companies, and call centers to target Medicare beneficiaries with telemarketing calls. In the calls, the lab owner falsely stated that Medicare covered expensive cancer genetic tests.
Patel bought signed physician orders from telemedicine businesses with the use of patient brokers by offering payments and bribes after Medicare beneficiaries consented to do a test. Patel ordered patient brokers to sign contracts that falsely claimed they were providing genuine advertising services for LabSolutions in order to conceal the payments, DOJ said.
The telemedicine doctors approved the expensive testing even though they were not treating the beneficiaries and often did not speak to them. From July 2016 to August 2019, LabSolutions submitted more than $463 million in claims to Medicare, including unnecessary medically genetic tests. Medicare paid more than $187 million, and Patel personally received more than $21 million.
Patel was convicted of one count of conspiracy to commit healthcare fraud and wire fraud, three counts of healthcare fraud, one count of conspiracy to defraud the US and to pay and receive illegal healthcare kickbacks, four counts of paying illegal healthcare kickbacks, and one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering.