Home Health & Hospice Week

Qui tam law firms reach out to employees.

You’d better make sure you’re running a tight ship compliance-wise, or you may find yourself facing whistleblower-induced scrutiny.

That’s what happened to these two home care providers who were targets of qui tam suits based on home health billing violations:

In Florida: Palm Beach-based Healthquest Inc. and its owners, Frank Jaramillo and Ruth Jaramillo, have agreed to pay $1.5 million to settle allegations that Healthquest paid kickbacks to marketers to induce patient referrals, the Department of Justice says in a release. They also entered into a five-year Integrity Agreement.

From December 2013 to May 2017, Healthquest paid kickbacks to its marketers to induce them to refer patients, alleged a whistleblower lawsuit filed by a former marketer. The qui tam relator will receive $300,000 in the case, the DOJ says.

In New York: Health Quest Systems Inc. and some subsidiaries will pay $14.7 million to resolve fraud charges. In addition to hospital and physician billing misdeeds, Health Quest allegedly submitted home health claims that lacked sufficient medical records to support the claim, including documentation of a face-to-face encounter with a physician, the DOJ says in a release.

Four whistleblowers in three suits will receive more than $2.7 million of the settlement. The relators, all former Health Quest employees, include a former Director of Operations and Corporate Compliance Officer.

News of rising whistleblower recoveries adds fuel to the fire for disgruntled employees who feel ignored by management, experts note.

So do ads and releases such as this recent one from the Corporate Whistleblower Center: “In our books there is nothing more disgusting than a hospice company billing Medicare or Medicaid for end of life services for individuals who are not dying. If you are a medical doctor, a registered nurse or a healthcare manager and you can prove a hospice company is signing up homeless people or drug addicts who are not dying please give us a call,” the firm says. “Recently a whistleblower received $1.4 million for exposing a company ... getting paid for providing end of life care for people not dying.”