Posted on 04/28/2017 8:35:52 PM PDT by Rockitz
Update: The Palm Beach Post just reported Melgen was convicted of all 67 counts.
A prominent Florida eye doctor has been convicted on all counts in his Medicare fraud trial, raising the possibility he could be pressured to testify in the bribery trial of New Jersey Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez, the Associated Press reported on Friday afternoon:
Jurors announced their verdict Friday for Dr. Salomon Melgen. He effectively faces a life sentence if no deal is struck. Menendez denies any wrongdoing.
Prosecutors contended that the 62-year-old Melgen stole up to $105 million from the federal insurance program between 2008 and 2013, by giving patients treatments and tests that couldnt help them.
Melgens attorneys argued that any billing issues were simply mistakes.
As Breitbart News has reported, the testimony presented by the prosecutions expert medical witnesses during the trial was very damaging, while the testimony of his own defense witnesses backfired.
The jury announced the verdict after its third day of deliberation.
On April 1, 2015, Melgen and his friend and political contribution beneficiary, Sen. Robert Menendez (D-New Jersey), were indicted on charges of public corruption.
Two weeks later, on April 15, Melgen was indicted on 76 charges of Medicare fraud. [P]rosecutors said [Melgen] attempted to bilk the health care program out of as much as $190 million, the Associated Press reported at the time of the second indictment.
Sen. Menendez has previously indicated he intends to run for re-election in 2018.
(Excerpt) Read more at breitbart.com ...
An acquaintance of mine had an eye problem....he went to the top eye doctor in the US-——the DR had treated Bob Hope.
The acquaintance got a bill for two eye surgeries...... only one was actually treated.
Luckily I have no fear of losing this doctor...and I’m going to pursue this
Do we have a ping list for “unnecessary testing?”
Leni
I think it was a money laundering operation for the democrat party members. He was the fall guy and did not know it.
I hope he rats out all the others involved.
Yeah me too if that was the case.
But in sanity checking their books, Medicare could at least check for plausibility of the volume of claims.
Did the problem get fixed? (The double billing)
My acquaintance pointed it out to the DR’s office.....who knows what they sent Medicare.
For a spinal injection [interthecal] imaging is required to place the needle at exactly the right point; mistakes not allowed. However, the greatest charge may well have been for legal protection.
A big ol red light should have been flashing with a siren going off.
This goes way back to 1980. My wife was in intensive care for 14 days with double pneumonia. We received the hospital bill which was 100 pages computer printout. There were so many items for each day of hospital stay, I could not believe it. Most items had no description in English, rather just a code number for each item. There is not enough time in a 24 hour period to administer so many services each day. 5 different doctors padded the bill with a 2 minute visit to her room each day.
I called the hospital to explain the hundreds of code numbered items. They said I should ask our doctor for code explanations. Yeah right, our doctor was going to go through 100 pages full of line items with no description, just a code number.
Then I called the insurance company to explain why it was impossible to deliver 10 page long services in a single day, and I was present in the hospital 16 hours each day in the room and did not see 1/10th of what is in the bill. The insurance company said do not worry about it, they will pay the entire bill of $31,000, my share would be only $250.
I reached a conclusion that insurance company actually wants the hospital bill very high so that no one will dare to be without health insurance, and they can charge bigger premiums because the bills are so high.
You raise a very important point about why healthcare costs have outpaced inflation by huge margins. When I called the health insurance company to complain about being billed for fake services rendered in a hospital stay, their response was do not worry, they will pay all of that bill.
Which tells me, the insurance writers want to keep prices of hospitalization sky high, so that no one will dare be without health insurance. Higher bills justify higher premiums.
This is a common practice. You were correct in your analysis.
Leni
I think the point that I and others are making on this thread is a separate one. My own (conservative) doctor told me there's routinely two prices, one for those with good insurance, and others with poor or no insurance....and the prices are not even close to each other. This is one of the issues in the ongoing national health care debate.
Leni
Leni, it was a mess prior to Obamacare. But Obamacare was intentionally an unfathomable mess so that you and everyone will ask for single payer which sounds much simpler.
In other words, I hear your frustration. Sadly, I’ve known this would all occur since 1970’s. It’s been heartbreaking to watch, both as a patient and as one whose family works in medicine.
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