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How Lawyers Defend Home Health Fraud Allegations: Proving Your Innocence

How Lawyers Defend Home Health Fraud Allegations: Proving Your Innocence

Being accused of healthcare fraud can be scary. As a home health agency owner or employee, you may feel overwhelmed and unsure of how to defend yourself. The good news is, with the right legal defense team on your side, you can fight the allegations and protect your future. This article will walk you through how an experienced lawyer investigates these cases, the typical defenses used, and your options if faced with an audit or criminal investigation.

Understanding Home Health Fraud Allegations

Home health agencies provide important medical services to patients recovering at home. However, due to the complex billing and documentation rules, it’s easy for mistakes to happen that could look fraudulent to auditors. Some common allegations include:

  • Billing for services not provided: Agencies bill for nurse visits, therapy, or aide services that were not actually performed. This could be unintentional if care is not properly documented, or intentional fraud.
  • Upcoding: Billing for a higher level of service than what was provided in order to get a higher reimbursement rate. For example, billing skilled nursing services for visits that only required home health aide care.
  • Kickbacks: Paying doctors, hospitals, or beneficiaries cash in exchange for Medicare or Medicaid patient referrals. This violates the Anti-Kickback Statute.
  • Medically unnecessary care: Providing excessive services not needed for the patient’s condition in order to overbill Medicare.

These allegations can come from audits, whistleblowers, disgruntled employees, or investigations. If serious enough, it may lead to civil fines or criminal charges.

How Lawyers Investigate the Allegations

When defending a home health agency against fraud accusations, lawyers use various strategies to understand the facts and build their case:

  • Review documentation: Lawyers dig into the medical records, care plans, therapy notes, billing records, employee files, and other agency paperwork. This helps identify any compliance issues or sources of the allegations.
  • Interview employees: Sitting down with nurses, office staff, and other employees can uncover important details. Lawyers will try to understand policies, procedures, and day-to-day operations.
  • Assess compliance program: Lawyers evaluate the agency’s compliance plan, auditing processes, training, and implementation. A robust compliance program can be a strong defense.
  • Analyze billing records: Lawyers break down the billing data to spot trends, errors, anomalies and gain insights into the agency’s operations that could refute or explain allegations.
  • Deploy investigators: For serious criminal investigations, lawyers may utilize investigators to interview witnesses and obtain evidence to exonerate their client.
  • Consult experts: Healthcare billing, coding and regulatory experts are often needed to review records and provide opinions on proper billing protocols. Their testimony can be crucial for complicated cases.

Building a Strong Legal Defense

Using the evidence uncovered during their investigation, lawyers piece together arguments and defenses to fight the allegations and protect the client. Common defenses in home health fraud cases include:

  • Lack of intent – One of the hardest elements for prosecutors to prove is that the agency deliberately set out to defraud Medicare. Simple billing errors or misunderstandings of complex rules does not constitute intent. This is a major focus of the defense.
  • Minimal financial harm – Bringing in billing experts to analyze the data often reveals the dollar amount in question is fairly small. This makes it harder for prosecutors to justify bringing criminal charges.
  • Compliance program – Demonstrating the agency had a comprehensive compliance plan in place and was making good faith efforts to educate staff and self-audit goes a long way in negating allegations of purposeful fraud.
  • Blame rogue employees – When there is clear evidence that fraud was perpetrated by a few bad apples without management’s knowledge, the defense may shift blame to those individuals.
  • Medical necessity – Proving the services provided were medically necessary and benefited the patient is an important defense against accusations of excessive billing. Thorough medical records and expert witnesses are key.
  • Confusion over regulations – Given the complexity of home health rules, demonstrating the allegations were due to misunderstandings or unclear guidance from Medicare can sometimes get charges dismissed or reduced.

Responding to Audits and Investigations

Here are some tips if your home health agency finds itself the target of an audit or under investigation:

  • Consult experienced attorneys immediately – You need lawyers well-versed in Medicare rules and fraud investigations on your side right away. The earlier they can get involved the better.
  • Be cautious in responding – Do not destroy records or immediately hand over documents. Your lawyers should interface with auditors and investigators on your behalf.
  • Get your billing house in order – Use any window before a potential audit starts to self-audit your records and billing practices to identify and address any issues.
  • Cooperate appropriately – While not volunteering unnecessary information, be sure to comply with subpoenas and investigator requests with your attorney’s guidance. Failure to cooperate can make matters much worse.
  • Begin compliance training – If your compliance program is found lacking, take swift action to implement staff training and tighter protocols. This demonstrates a desire to rectify problems.
  • Negotiate resolution – Depending on the findings, your lawyers may be able to negotiate a favorable settlement or avoid criminal charges altogether through meetings with prosecutors.
  • Prepare your defense – If the case moves forward, your attorneys will continue building defenses by interviewing witnesses, reviewing evidence, and consulting experts to rebut the allegations in court if necessary.

Being proactive and working diligently with knowledgeable attorneys offers the best chance of resolving home health fraud accusations favorably. While the allegations can seem frightening, there are many avenues for establishing your innocence.

Fighting Fraud Allegations with an Experienced Legal Team

Dealing with audits and fraud investigations requires understanding complex healthcare regulations and legal protocols. Home health agencies should promptly consult with attorneys experienced in these cases at the first sign of allegations. Not only can the right lawyers defend your organization’s interests, but they can also help implement compliance programs and training to prevent issues from arising in the first place.With an in-depth investigation, strong defenses, and strategic negotiation, experienced healthcare fraud attorneys can resolve these cases while avoiding damage to the agency’s finances and reputation. Don’t wait to seek legal counsel if you find your home health agency under scrutiny – a swift response is key to protecting your future. With dedication and preparation, you can successfully fight fraud allegations and emerge with your integrity intact.<a name=”sources”></a>
Sources:

1

 Owner Of Home Health Agency Sentenced To 54 Months In Prison For Over $100 Million Health Care Fraud

2

 10 Defendants Arrested In Home-Health Aide Fraud Scheme

3

 Home Health Agency Fraud Defense

4

 How Lawyers Investigate and Defend Home Health Fraud Allegations

5

 Home Healthcare Services Fraud

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