CAMLAW: Complementary and Alternative Medicine Law Blog : Complementary, Alternative, & Integrative Medicine Law, Regulation, Ethics & Policy (Alternative and Complementary Medicine, Medical Spa Information, Holistic Health Attorney, and Legal Resources)

Washington, DC – Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) and Ranking Member Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) today released a Finance Committee report detailing the case of a doctor who reportedly implanted nearly 600 potentially medically unnecessary stents from 2007 through mid-2009 at St. Joseph Medical Center in Towson, Maryland, and his relationship with the manufacturer of the stents, Abbott Labs. The Senators’ report found that the questionable stent implantations cost the Medicare program $3.8 million during that period. Baucus and Grassley initiated their inquiry as part of the Committee’s oversight role of the Medicare and Medicaid programs and the Senators’ efforts to protect taxpayer dollars from waste, fraud and abuse after media reports unveiled the alleged improper procedures.

“Hospital patients expect their care to be based on medical need, not profits. This report sets forth alarming evidence that patients at St. Joseph Medical Center received unnecessary and potentially harmful stent implants time and again – a pattern that is shocking, disturbing and shameful. Doctors should not be performing invasive medical procedures patients don’t need, and taxpayers certainly shouldn’t be paying for these wasteful and improper implantations,” said Baucus. “Even more disconcerting is that this could be a sign of a larger national trend of wasteful medical device use, which is why we included aggressive new tools in the new health care law to fight fraud, waste and abuse. The health care law improves screening of medical providers and increases oversight to root out fraud, waste and abuse like this, shining a spotlight on problems like these and helping ensure cases like this don’t happen again.”

“The best response to these concerns is total transparency and effective peer review,” Grassley said.

The health care oversight report also examined the response of St. Joseph Medical Center to the discovery of the questionable implantations. The report notes that Abbott Labs placed the Maryland doctor on its “Project Victory” list of top stent volume cardiologists and paid for at least two social events at the doctor’s home, including a barbeque and crab dinner, in 2008. After St. Joseph Medical Center barred the doctor from practicing, Abbott Labs hired the doctor to promote and prepare safety reports on its stents in China and Japan, according to internal documents the company provided to the Committee.

From fiscal year 2004 to fiscal year 2009, the Medicare Part A program paid an estimated $25.7 billion for cardiac stent procedures and approximately $108.9 billion for 6.9 million procedures related to medical devices. Fraud, waste and abuse in the health care system cost Americans at least $60 billion a year – three percent of total health care spending. Other similar cases of apparently improper cardiac procedures have been uncovered at medical facilities across the country. Baucus and Grassley launched their review of this case to look for patterns that might have implications for preventing waste, fraud and abuse in Medicare and Medicaid.

***

Our law office has attorneys with legal experience in FDA matters, including guiding clients involved in health care delivery, group medical and private medical practice, who are concerned about issues at the interface of federal and state law, concerned about medical board discipline or medical malpractice liability issues.  We also review and draft informed consent forms and guide clients concerning a variety of health care law issues.

If you have legal questions concerning telemedicine and telehealth practices, HIPAA legal issues, health care reform questions, or other health law matters in New York, California, Massachusetts, Washington DC, and other states, contact a lawyer who knows the rules.

Consult an experienced health care law attorney who knows complementary medicine and integrative medicine for legal advice pertaining to any project involving allied health or CAM professionals.

***

Michael H. Cohen is a health care law and business law attorney providing business legal advice to green entrepreneurs and companies, and health care law advice to businesses and physicians, acupuncturists, naturopathic doctors, homeopaths and others in the holistic health, wellness, and green industries. He works with telemedicine, medical devices, and cutting-edge technologies and gives clear legal advice to grow your business.

As a founding attorney of a law firm at the cutting edge of health care and business law, he represents enterprises poised for vertical lift, whose leaders are conscious, intuitive, and committed to shaping a better world. Michael also advises medical spas and integrative medicine clinics, physicians, chiropractors, naturopathic physicians, massage therapists, energy healers, nutritionists and herbalists, dietary supplement and cosmetics companies, and businesses with bio-energy and other technologies and medical devices. The website also offers the Entrepreneur’s Legal Toolkit as a series of legal guides to businesses.

See what clients say about his work, visit the Legal Services page for information on business law and healthcare legal services where alternative billing arrangements (such as a flat rate or project fee) can be discussed for discrete projects such as incorporation for entrepreneurs, review and drafting of business contracts, trademark, and package health law services.

Our healthcare law and business law firm also provides special expertise to attorneys and law firms whose clients are involved in wellness industry projects or who require guidance regarding fee-splitting, Stark, anti-kickback, medical board discipline, medical malpractice liability, HIPAA, Medicare, and other health law and regulatory compliance issues.

To speak with a lawyer about health care law issues pertaining to complementary and alternative medicine, or to consult a business lawyer about laws and legal issues for entrepreneurs and new enterprises that are seeking legal advice, contact our law firm today.