Industry Notes:
Suppliers Battle Another Scathing OIG Report
Published on Fri Jul 17, 2009
This time, the feds take aim at support surfaces. You'll see more medical review for pressure reducing support surfaces if a federal watchdog gets its way. Inappropriate Medicare payments still abound for pressure reducing support surfaces, says a new report from the HHS Office of Inspector General. They amounted to about $33 million for these items during the first half of 2007 alone. Background: The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services categorizes support surfaces into three groups based on the complexity of their features and Group 2 is the largest, the OIG notes in a new report. The OIG found that 80 percent of group 2 support surface claims did not meet Medicare's clinical coverage requirements. And 33 percent of claims did not meet supplier documentation requirements. Over three-quarters of the claims that did not meet supplier documentation requirements also did not meet Medicare's clinical coverage requirements. The review also [...]