The only thing missing was the cock crowing.
Article published September 6, 2012
Planned Parenthood settles with Illinois on Medicaid payments
By Andrew L. Wang, Crain’s Chicago Business
Posted: September 6, 2012 - 11:00 am ET
Tags: Illinois, Legal, Physicians
Planned Parenthood of Illinois has agreed to pay the state $367,000 to settle a dispute over alleged overbilling of the Medicaid program by the not-for-profit’s medical director.
Dr. Caroline Hoke, an obstetrician-gynecologist and the organization’s medical director since 2007, had been under threat of termination from the state Medicaid program since 2010, when the inspector general of the Department of Healthcare and Family Services sought to recover allegedly improper payments.
Dr. Hoke was the fourth-highest billing physician in the state Medicaid program in 2009-11, receiving $3.9 million, despite not receiving any payment for much of 2010 and all of 2011, according to a Crain’s analysis of Medicaid reimbursement records.
The settlement comes about a week after the mother of a Planned Parenthood patient filed a wrongful-death lawsuit against the organization, alleging that negligence during an abortion contributed to her daughter’s death.
In the Medicaid case, the agency alleged that Dr. Hoke overbilled the state an estimated $430,380.02, mostly for services that were not documented, according to records in a DHFS administrative proceeding against Dr. Hoke.
The inspector general contested Dr. Hoke’s billings between 2006 and 2007, when she worked at Planned Parenthood of Illinois locations and at Erie Family Health Center. The West Side clinic separately agreed to pay the state $20,000 to settle its portion of the dispute.
With the settlement, neither Planned Parenthood of Illinois nor Erie admits any wrongdoing or responsibility for the overbilling.
More than 80 percent of the amount being paid back to DHFS was for “recordkeeping matters related to billing for birth control,” Planned Parenthood said in a statement.
Read at:
http://www.modernhealthcare.com/article/20120906/INFO/309069993/?template=printpicart