Corporate Compliance

OIG releases three new audit reports

Compliance Monitor, May 24, 2006

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The OIG, Friday, released three new audit reports dealing with a range of issues, from ambulance transports to GME payments.

The following is a summary of the reports:

  • The OIG found that American Medical Response (AMR) of Massachusetts received $11,690 in unallowable Medicare payments for ambulance transports July 1 through December 1, 2002. From these results, the OIG estimates that the company received nearly $2 million for improperly billed services. In November 2002, the company self-disclosed that its compliance team had found questionable billing practices resulting in Medicare overpayments totaling $275,288 during June, July, and August 2002. AMR refunded that amount to its carrier.

    Click here to read the OIG report "Review of Ambulance Services Provided by American Medical Response of Massachusetts, Inc." (A-01-04-00502).

  • The OIG is recommending that Blue Cross Blue Shield of Utah identify Medicare segment assets of $2 million as of January 1, 1998. The OIG determined that Utah did not correctly identify the initial allocation of pension plan assets to the Medicare segment as of January 1, 1986. The audit also found that the plan did not comply with the Medicare contract's pension segmentation requirements for updating Medicare segment assets from January 1, 1986 to January 1, 1991.

    Click here to read the OIG report "Review of Medicare Contractor's Pension Segmentation Requirements at Blue Cross Blue Shield of Utah for the Period Covering January 1, 1986, to January 1, 1998" (A-07-05-00190).

  • The OIG found that $24.1 million in Medicaid graduate medical education (GME) funds were included in intergovernmental transfers between Iowa and the University of Iowa Hospitals, a publicly owned hospital. The intergovernmental transfers carried no assurance that funds would be used for the graduate medical education program or to provide services to Medicaid-eligible individuals. The hospital returned the entire $24.1 million graduate medical education payment and Iowa incurred no liability for the overall graduate medical education program.

    Click here to read the OIG report "Review of Medicaid Support for Graduate Medical Education in Iowa" (A-07-04-03055).



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