Monthly Archives: May 2021
Post-COVID (ish) RAC Audits – Temporary Restrictions
2020 was an odd year for recovery audit contractor (“RAC”) and Medicare Administrative Contractors (“MAC”) audits. Well, it was an odd year for everyone. After trying five virtual trials, each one with up to 23 witnesses, it seems that, slowly but surely, we are getting back to normalcy. A tell-tale sign of fresh normalcy is an in-person defense of health care regulatory audits. I am defending a RAC audit of pediatric facility in Georgia in a couple weeks and the clerk of court said – “The hearing is in person.” Well, that’s new. Even when we specifically requested a virtual trial, we were denied with the explanation that GA is open now. The virtual trials are cheaper and more convenient; clients don’t have to pay for hotels and airlines.
In-person hearings are back – at least in most states. We have similar players and new restrictions.
On March 16, 2021, CMS announced that it will temporarily restrict audits to March 1, 2020, and before. Medicare audits are not yet dipping its metaphoric toes into the shark infested waters of auditing claims with dates of service (“DOS”) March 1 – today. This leaves a year and half time period untouched. Once the temporary hold is lifted, audits of 2020 DOS will be abound. March 26, 2021, CMS awarded Performant Recovery, Inc., the incumbent, the new RAC Region 1 contract.
RAC’s review claims on a post-payment and/or pre-payment basis. (FYI – You would rather a post payment review rather than a pre – I promise).
The RACs were created to detect fraud, waste, and abuse (“FWA”) by reviewing medical records. Any health care provider – not matter how big or small – are subject to audits at the whim of the government. CMS, RACs, MCOs, MACs, TPEs, UPICs, and every other auditing company can implement actions that will prevent future improper payments, as well. As we all know, RACs are paid on a contingency basis. Approximately, 13%. When the RACs were first created, the RACs were compensated based on accusations of overpayments, not the amounts that were truly owed after an independent tribunal. As any human could surmise, the contingency payment creates an overzealousness that can only be demonstrated by my favorite case in my 21 years – in New Mexico against Public Consulting Group (“PCG”). A behavioral health care (“BH”) provider was accused of over $12 million overpayment. After we presented before the administrative law judge (“ALJ”) in NM Administrative Court, the ALJ determined that we owed $896.35. The 99.23% reduction was because of the following:
- Faulty Extrapolation: NM HSD’s contractor PCG reviewed approximately 150 claims out of 15,000 claims between 2009 and 2013. Once the error rate was defined as high as 92%, the base error equaled $9,812.08; however the extrapolated amount equaled over $12 million. Our expert statistician rebutted the error rate being so high. Once the extrapolation is thrown out, we are now dealing with much more reasonable amounts – only $9k
- Attack the Clinical Denials: The underlying, alleged overpayment of $9,812.08 was based on 150 claims. We walked through the 150 claims that PCG claimed were denials and proved PCG wrong. Examples of their errors include denials based on lack of staff credentialing, when in reality, the auditor could not read the signature. Other denials were erroneously denied based the application of the wrong policy year.
The upshot is that we convinced the judge that PCG was wrong in almost every denial PCG made. In the end, the Judge found we owed $896.35, not $12 million. Little bit of a difference! We appealed.
“5 Minutes With” Knicole Emanuel from Practus LLP
I had the pleasure of being interviewed a second time on Legal Buzz. Thanks, Alex!!
To Disclose or Not to Disclose: The Answer Could Terminate Your Medicaid Contract
Changes of ownership of a facility can spur RAC, MAC, and MCO audits. In fact, federal regulations require disclosure of changes of ownership within 35 days after any change of ownership. 42 CFR 455.104. The regulations require disclosure, but there is no guidance regarding acceptance of said change of ownership. In other words what if your company undergoes a change in ownership and the MCO or MAC terminates the participation agreement because they don’t appreciate who the new owner is. The federal regulations also require disclosure of any convictions related to Medicaid. 42 CFR 455.106. In the particular case I am discussing, the MCO audited this company 10-15 times over two years. There seemed to be a personal vendetta, for whatever reason, against the company from higher-ups at the MCO.
Managed care can be tricky because, by definition, it removes the management of Medicaid and Medicare from the government agencies into these quasi-private/quasi-governmental agencies. I still think that managed care violates 42 CFR 410(e), the single state agency requirement that states that “The Medicaid agency may not delegate, to other than its own officials, the authority to supervise the plan or to develop or issue policies, rules, and regulations on program matters.” Despite my personal opinion, managed care is definitely the trend. To date, 40 States have managed care organizations (MCOs) to manage Medicaid.
This company is a behavioral health care provider, which provides substance abuse services, SAIOP, SACOT, PSR, OPT, urine tests; they run a Suboxone clinic, a laboratory, and a pharmacy. It also provides free/charitable transportation services to get the consumers to the facility without receiving any money in return. The CEO was accused of personal, tax fraud. He and his wife never submitted their own taxes; they relied on professionals. One, below-stellar accountant performed the companies’ taxes and the CEO’s personal taxes a few years ago. I am no tax expert, but apparently the problem was that he took no salary for two years while the facility was bringing in little profit. His wife is a physician, so they were able to sustain on one income. A lot of confusion later and multiple tax and criminal attorneys, CEO pled guilty to a personal tax plea. It is a Martha Stewart mistake, not a Bernie Madoff. The guilty plea was not germane to Medicaid.
Once the CEO pleads guilty to the personal plea, the newspaper publishes a story. The MCO first terminates the contract based on 42 CFR 455.106, which requires disclosure if – and the exact wording is important – “Has been convicted of a criminal offense related to that person’s involvement in any program under Medicare, Medicaid, or the Title XX services program since the inception of those programs.” This guilty plea was not related to Medicaid so the termination was erroneous.
Concurrently, in light of the CEO’s plea, he steps down and his wife who is also a medical physician steps in to transition as CEO to keep the company going. Obviously, a company is bigger than its CEO’s personal transgressions. 200 staff and hundreds of consumers relied on its viability as a company.
Once we argued that the personal guilty plea was not related to Medicaid, the MCO added the additional reason for termination – failing to disclose a change in ownership. A double whammy!
We were able to successfully file a preliminary injunction arguing that irreparable harm would ensue if the termination were upheld. We also argued that the terminations were erroneous. The Judge agreed in this case agreeing that a company is indeed bigger than its CEO’s transgressions.
We always think about audits involving medical records. But audits can also involve audits of corporate disclosures or nondisclosures of managerial issues. Audits of provider executive teams can be deadly to any company.
Terminations of provider agreements are always tricky because, most often, the MCO or MAC will argue that it can terminate the Medicaid/care contract at will. I disagree, first and foremost. See blog, “Property Rights.”
If a facility is terminated for cause, that reason better be accurate!
In this case, the CEO had no duty to disclose his personal, guilty plea per the regulations. Secondly, the MCOs’ assertion that it had no notice of the transfer of ownership was equally as disingenuous. The facility had been open and honest regarding the transition of the company to a new CEO. While no formal notice was ever provided, there was clear communication about the transition to/from the MCO.
Thus, we were successful in obtaining an injunction; thereby keeping the company viable.
The Grey Area Between Civil and Criminal Fraud
This segment is rated ‘F’ for fraud. It is not for the meek of heart. How many of you have read a newspaper or seen the news about Medicare and Medicaid provider fraudsters? There is a grey area between civil and criminal prosecutions of fraud. Some innocent providers get caught in the wide, fraud net because counsel doesn’t understand the idiosyncrasies of Medicare regulations.
Health care fraud GENERALLY exists as one of the following:
- Billing for services not rendered;
- Billing for a non-covered service as a covered service;
- Misrepresenting the DOS
- Misrepresenting location of service;
- Misrepresenting provider of service
- Waiving deductibles and/or co-payments
- Incorrect reporting of diagnoses or procedures;
- Overutilization of services;
- Kickbacks/referrals for money
- False or unnecessary issuance of prescription drugs
To err is human. Or so Alexander Pope says. I am here to attest that many of those accused providers are innocent and victims of unspecialized criminal attorneys.
One plastic surgeon knows this only too well. Quick anecdote:
Doctor was audited for removing lesions from the eye area and accused of billing for removing cancerous lesions even when the biopsies came back benign. Yet Medicare instructs physicians to NOT go back and change a CPT code after the fact. The physician is supposed to make an educated guess as to whether the lesion removed is benign or malignant. There are no crystal balls so he makes an educated determination.
Since plastic surgery is highly specialized and the physician is highly educated. Deference should be given to the physician regardless.
This plastic surgeon was accused of upcoding and billing for services not rendered. He performed biopsies around the eye of possible, cancerous lesions. Once removed, he would send the samples to lab. Meanwhile, before knowing whether the samples were cancerous, because he believed them to be cancerous, billed for removal of cancerous lesion to Medicare. Correct coding for skin procedures is not impossible.
In a Local Coverage Determination (“LCD”), beginning 2008, Medicare instructed physicians to not go back and change codes depending on the pathology. “If a benign skin lesion excision was performed, report the applicable CPT code, even if final pathology demonstrates a malignant or carcinoma diagnosis for the lesion removed. The final pathology does not change the CPT code of the procedure performed.” See LCD: Removal of Benign Skin Lesions, 2008. This plastic surgeon relied on CMS’ Medicare regulations and policies, including the Medicare Provider Manual and LCD 2008, which are published by the government and on which Dr. relied.
Doctor hired two criminal attorneys who did not specialize in Medicare. Doctor gets charged, and attorneys convince him to plead guilty claiming that he cannot fight the government. And that the government will seize his property if he doesn’t settle.
He pled guilty to a crime that he did not do. He paid millions in restitution, was under house arrest for 15 months, the Medical Board revoked his medical license, and he lost his career.
The lesson here is always fight the government. But choose wisely with whom you fight.
Increased Medicare Reimbursements and Nursing Home Audits
HEAR YE, HEAR YE: Medicare reimbursement rate increase!!
On April 27th, CMS proposed a rule to increase Medicare fee-for-service payment rates and policies for inpatient hospitals and long-term care hospitals for fiscal year (FY) 2022. The proposed rule will update Medicare payment policies and rates for operating and capital‑related costs of acute care hospitals and for certain hospitals. The proposed increase in operating payment rates for general acute care hospitals paid under the IPPS that successfully participate in the Hospital Inpatient Quality Reporting (“IQR”) Program and are meaningful electronic health record (“EHR”) users is approximately 2.8%. This reflects the projected hospital market basket update of 2.5% reduced by a 0.2 percentage point productivity adjustment and increased by a 0.5 percentage point adjustment required by legislation.
Secondly, a sample audit of nursing homes conducted by CMS will lead to more scrutiny of nursing homes and long-term care facilities. The sample audit showed that two-thirds of Massachusetts’s nursing homes that receive federal Medicaid and Medicare funding are lagging in required annual inspections — and MA is demonstrative of the country.
237 nursing homes and long-term care facilities in the state, or 63.7% of the total, are behind on their federal health and safety inspections by at least 18 months. The national average is 51.3%.
We cannot blame COVID for everything. Those inspections lagged even before the pandemic, the data shows, but ground to a halt last year when the federal agency discontinued in-person visits to nursing homes as they were closed off to the public to help prevent spread of the COVID.
Lastly, on April 29, 2021, CMS issued a final rule to extend and make changes to the Comprehensive Care for Joint Replacement (“CJR”) model. You’ve probably heard Dr. Ron Hirsch reporting on the joint replacement model on RACMonitor. The CJR model aims to pay providers based on total episodes of care for hip and knee replacements to curb costs and improve quality. Hospitals in the model that meet spending and quality thresholds can get an additional Medicare payment. But hospitals that don’t meet targets must repay Medicare for a portion of their spending.
This final rule revises the episode definition, payment methodology, and makes other modifications to the model to adapt the CJR model to changes in practice and fee-for-service payment occurring over the past several years. The changes in practice and payment are expected to limit or reverse early evaluation results demonstrating the CJR model’s ability to achieve savings while sustaining quality. This rule provides the time needed to test modifications to the model by extending the CJR model for an additional three performance years through December 31, 2024 for certain participant hospitals.
The CJR model has proven successful according to CMS. It began in 2016. Hospitals had a “statistically significant decrease” in average payments for all hip and knee replacements relative to a control group. $61.6 million (a savings of 2% of the baseline)
