http://www.jdjournal.com/2012/07/26/obama-and-insurance-industry-team-to-fight-healthcare-fraud/ Legal Industry News Mon, 17 Jun 2013 13:17:00 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 http://www.jdjournal.com/2012/07/26/obama-and-insurance-industry-team-to-fight-healthcare-fraud/comment-page-1/#comment-75209 Dorothy LaBarbera Sat, 28 Jul 2012 16:50:28 +0000 http://www.jdjournal.com/?p=46658#comment-75209 This kind of oversight has been needed for a long, long time. Even everyday, practicing physicians have been known to lean on the MediCare/MedicAid system by ordering too many expensive tests, based on little reason. Some of these tests are invasive and even dangerous. If something goes wrong during a diagnostic test, these doctors make MORE money trying to save their patient! This shady practice works well especially on a patient population that is elderly and/or chronically ill. The unnecessary test or procedure that goes wrong can be blamed on the original condition of the patient. (Also, combination medications used on the aging and chronically ill will mask adverse effects and make it difficult to track down a pattern of serious side effects.) If the medical establishment cannot or will not police itself, then we have to welcome government intervention in an area of our lives that would have been better left to the private sector. This kind of oversight has been needed for a long, long time. Even everyday, practicing physicians have been known to lean on the MediCare/MedicAid system by ordering too many expensive tests, based on little reason. Some of these tests are invasive and even dangerous. If something goes wrong during a diagnostic test, these doctors make MORE money trying to save their patient! This shady practice works well especially on a patient population that is elderly and/or chronically ill. The unnecessary test or procedure that goes wrong can be blamed on the original condition of the patient. (Also, combination medications used on the aging and chronically ill will mask adverse effects and make it difficult to track down a pattern of serious side effects.) If the medical establishment cannot or will not police itself, then we have to welcome government intervention in an area of our lives that would have been better left to the private sector.

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