tci Medicare Compliance & Reimbursement - 2006 Issue 43

GAO ~ HHS Blames Medicare For Most Improper Payments

But Medicare does a better job of collecting documentation from providers. The federal government spent $7 billion less in improper payments in 2005 than in 2004, according to the Government Accountability Office (GAO). And this reduction was mostly thanks to a reduction in wasteful Medicare spending. The catch: The GAO says this improvement mostly came from a change in how Medicare estimated improper spending, not from any "improved payment controls." "When providers do not submit documentation to justify payments received, these payments were counted by HHS as erroneous," the GAO notes. But the fact that the Department...

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