The U.S. Department of Justice is intervening in a whistleblower lawsuit against IPC The Hospitalist Co., the department announced yesterday.
The suit, originally filed by Bijan Oughatiyan, a former IPC physician, under the qui tam provisions of the False Claims Act, alleges that IPC submitted false claims to the federal healthcare programs by upcoding medical services.
[See also: Fraud recoveries on the rise]
Oughatiyan filed the case under seal in 2009, reported the San Fernando Valley Business Journal. The journal also reported that the doctor worked for IPC in San Antonio from 2003 to 2008.
According to a press release issued by the DOJ Monday, the suit claims that IPC “encouraged its physicians to bill at the highest levels regardless of the level of service provided, trained physicians to use higher level codes and encouraged physicians with lower billing levels to ‘catch up’ to their peers.”
By intervening, the government takes over the lawsuit and can recover three times its damages plus civil penalties. The DOJ has asked the U.S. District Court in Chicago for 120 days to file its own complaint detailing the government’s specific allegations.
Per the IPC website, the California-based company’s 2,000 or so hospitalists serve 350 acute care and 800 post-acute care facilities in 26 states.
The company did not issue a press statement about the lawsuit and told the San Fernando Valley Business Journal that it would not comment on the suit because it is ongoing.