In a new investigation a Senate Finance Committee has found that a former cardiologist, Mark Midei at Towson, Md.-based St. Joseph Medical Center performed 585 medically unnecessary stent implants, costing Medicare and private insurers a combined $6.6 million in fraudulent reimbursement fees. These stents are special medicated or wire tubes that are placed inside coronary arteries of the heart to prevent them from collapsing or clogging up which may lead to a hear attack.
The report that covers time between 2007 and 2009 showed that Midei performed the stent implants all of which were manufactured by Abbott Laboratories. The cost of the implants ran up to nearly $4 million in reimbursement fees and got Midei a place on Abbott’s Project Victory list of top stent-volume cardiologists. Abbott also paid nearly $2,000 for at least two social events hosted at the physician’s home and hired him as a consultant after 321-bed St. Joseph barred the doctor from practicing at the medical center. Midei also allegedly received nearly $31,000 from Abbott for his consulting work. However Stephen Snyder, Midei’s attorney said, “I believe this report is an incomplete one as they failed to interview either Dr. Midei or Abbott directly.”
Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) has said, “This report sets forth alarming evidence that patients at St. Joseph Medical Center received unnecessary and potentially harmful stent implants… Even more disconcerting is that this could be a sign of a larger national trend of wasteful medical device use.”
St. Joseph had also recently agreed to pay $22 million to settle a federal probe into allegations that its contracts with MidAtlantic Cardiovascular Associates created kickbacks and prohibited referrals to other cardiovascular practices.
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