KFF Well being Information has sued the U.S. Division of Well being and Human Companies Workplace of Inspector Common to compel it to launch a spread of Medicare Benefit well being plan audits and different monetary information.
The suit, filed Nov. 12 in U.S. District Court docket in San Francisco below the Freedom of Data Act, or FOIA, seeks paperwork from the HHS inspector basic’s workplace, which acts as a watchdog over federal medical insurance packages run by the Facilities for Medicare & Medicaid Companies.
The swimsuit asks for correspondence and different information of contact between HHS officers or their representatives and Medicare Benefit organizations regarding overpayment audit findings and potential monetary penalties.
It additionally seeks information reflecting communication between HHS and CMS officers concerning the federal government’s insurance policies for recovering overpayments found throughout Medicare Benefit audits, together with a controversial decision in January 2023 to restrict greenback recoveries for audits courting again a decade or extra.
Moreover, the swimsuit seeks copies of presidency contracts awarded to outdoors corporations which have carried out Medicare Benefit audits, together with budgets and efficiency evaluations, courting to 2020. In these audits, reviewers take a pattern of 200 sufferers from a well being plan and decide whether or not medical information assist the diagnoses the federal government paid well being plans to deal with.
KFF Well being Information requested the information in August, however, greater than two months later, “no paperwork, responsive or in any other case, have been produced,” the swimsuit says.
Sam Cate-Gumpert, an lawyer with Davis Wright Tremaine, which is representing KFF Well being Information professional bono within the case, stated the knowledge is “critically essential to public oversight of presidency misspending.”
In keeping with the swimsuit, the inspector basic’s workplace has audited the Medicare Benefit program greater than three dozen occasions since 2019, revealing billions of {dollars} in overpayments.
However authorities officers haven’t recouped the overcharges, in accordance with the swimsuit.
The HHS Workplace of Inspector Common “has left taxpayers footing the invoice for billions of {dollars} in overpayments — although HHS OIG’s main goal is to fight fraud and waste in Medicare and different federally funded well being packages,” the swimsuit alleges.
“The truth is, taxpayers have been pressured to pay for the Medicare Benefit program’s wasteful spending twice — first, due to this system itself, and second, due to the prices of the audits, which the federal government spends thousands and thousands of {dollars} to conduct,” in accordance with the swimsuit.
Medicare Benefit, largely run by personal insurance coverage firms, has enrolled greater than 33 million seniors and folks with disabilities, greater than half of individuals on Medicare.
However this system has confronted criticism that it prices billions of dollars more than it should with analysis exhibiting that many well being plans exaggerate how sick sufferers are to spice up funds.
A FOIA lawsuit filed by KFF Well being Information in September 2019 prompted CMS to release summaries of 90 Medicare Benefit audits revealing thousands and thousands of {dollars} in overpayments. As a part of a settlement, CMS paid $63,000 in KFF Well being Information’ authorized charges, although it didn’t admit to wrongfully withholding the information.
The HHS Workplace of Inspector Common had no quick touch upon the swimsuit.
