Ohio’s Crackdown on Medical Billing Fraud

Recently, several Ohio home health providers have been caught red handed in medical billing fraud. There is nothing worse than medical billing fraud. It costs the United States citizens billions of dollars each and every year. To prevent this fraud, the state of Ohio created a task force to investigate Medicaid providers. This task force found four separate incidences of medical billing fraud.

One of the main cases found was with Community Home Health Services Inc and Kevin Dennis. Apparently, this organization billed Medicaid over $32 million dollars in fraudulent payments between June of 2000 and May of 2005. Kevin Dennis used $650,000 of this fraudulent medical billing for his own personal use. The services billed were skilled nursing and home health care services that were never provided.

There was yet another example of non provided services billed to Medicaid by Angel Health Care and Wilma Kpohanu. She, just like Dennis did medical billing for skilled nursing visits without providing that service.

Another medical billing fraud charge was brought against Ohio’s Hood Medical Services of Columbus and George Hood III. Apparently they made false statements and forged medical notes and documents to receive medical billing payment from Medicare. This included wrong dates of service and wrong providers.

The medical billing task force did find four cases of fraud, but there are surely more to be found. Ending fraud would mean the end to unnecessary payments. This could help reduce the costs of healthcare and medical billing.

Be sure you practice is upfront and honest with your medical billing practices. One wrong decision could cost you your license and dignity.

View all Articles by: Melissa Clark, CCS-P