Dead Doctors Paid Millions by Medicare
July 2008 | Filed under General Interest, Health Topics
Another reason to become a Doctor: You can still make money even AFTER you’re dead!
As revealed in a new congressional investigation, Medicare has paid out 478,500 claims on health services to doctors who died before they performed such services.
And to think, farmers thought they had it made by being paid money by the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture to NOT grow crops.
According to this congressional report, Medicare has paid out as much as $92 million to 18,240 dead doctors. A frighteningly large percentage of those doctors (16 percent) have been dead for 10 to 15 years!
RELATED ARTICLE (from the New York Times):
“Report Links Dead Doctors to Payments by Medicare
By ROBERT PEAR
Published: July 9, 2008
WASHINGTON — Congressional investigators said Tuesday that Medicare had paid tens of millions of dollars to suppliers improperly using identification numbers of doctors who died years ago.
The government has no reliable way to spot claims linked to dead doctors, many of whom are still listed as active Medicare providers though they died 10 or 15 years ago, the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations said.
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