The Deloitte Forensic Center reports that complying with federal statutes and regulations continues to get more complex for hospitals. Regulations intended to address perceived abuse of Medicare and Medicaid spending keep growing in scope and in disclosure requirements as public officials strive to address different varieties of healthcare fraud. Regulatory agencies estimate that fraud and self-dealing could be costing Medicare and Medicaid as much as $200 billion per year.
Additionally, last September regulators announced a new information-collection program requiring about 500 hospitals to file comprehensive reports on their contractual relationships with physicians. The program imposes stiff penalties ($10,000 per day) for late filings. Also, there will be much more scrutiny of the contractual relationships that physicians have with hospitals, other health systems, imaging centers, durable medical equipment suppliers, and other health professionals--which will take more careful effort on the part of hospitals and their senior management. The timing of this requirement is still unknown.
To help clarify the issue, the Deloitte Forensic Center prepared a summary of the federal anti-kickback and physician self-referral statutes that have generated a number of government investigations. Read the article.
