Medicare Compliance & Reimbursement

If your physician practice or hospital still has these in place, watch out. Trick or treat: October debuted Stark IV changes that could come back to haunt providers that haven't revamped what are now illegal leasing deals. As of Oct. 1, CMS no longer allows certain types of variable rent arrangements for property and equipment under the applicable Stark exceptions, according to attorney Wayne J. Miller, with the Compliance Law Group in Los Angeles. The rental deals include "per click" arrangements where a physician or physician group leases space or equipment to a hospital and receives a payment each time the hospital uses the property to care for Medicare patients referred by the physician or group. "Most commonly, these arrangements involve an MRI, PET scanner or lithotripsy machine, as examples, where a specialty physician group buys the equipment and ... leases it to the hospital for use," says Miller. Hidden twist: [...]