PHILADELPHIA, Dec. 21, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- A Philadelphia region company has agreed to pay $44.875 million to settle allegations that it defrauded U.S. taxpayers by outsourcing critical remote medical services to technicians in India who were not properly trained.
The fraud allegations against Malvern, Pa.-based BioTelemetry, Inc., now a Royal Philips company, emerged through a whistleblower lawsuit brought by Ross Feller Casey, LLP, of Philadelphia, on behalf of former company employees.
Ross Feller Casey's
Brian J. McCormick, Jr., a top national whistleblower attorney, said the case centered around allegations that the company improperly billed Medicare and other federal programs for remote heart monitoring services between 2013 and 2022.
With remote heart monitoring, information from a patient's monitoring device is transmitted around the clock to technicians to provide doctors with early indications of trouble.
The company was supposed to perform those vital services in the U.S. but allegedly hired technicians in India instead. Also, the company faced allegations that the technicians in India were not licensed or certified to perform the monitoring, as required by federal law. According to the settlement, fewer than 3 percent of the technicians who reviewed data of U.S. Medicare patients were properly certified.
BioTelemetry was formerly known as CardioNet, LLC, and based in Conshohocken, Pa. BioTelemetry became a wholly-owned subsidiary of Philips in 2021.
Ross Feller Casey, noted for a recent series of victories in whistleblower cases, filed the lawsuit in federal court in Philadelphia in 2018. The federal government investigated the claims for more than four years, then joined the case, alleging the company violated the federal False Claims Act.
The False Claims Act allows citizens like these whistleblowers to report fraud they have witnessed involving federal programs or funds and earn a reward due to their reporting. The whistleblowers will split $8.3 million.
McCormick complimented Eric Gill and Erin Lindgren of the U.S. Attorney's Office in Philadelphia, and former AUSA John Crutchlow, for their outstanding work on the case.
"This case is a testament to the powerful public interest served by a collaboration between government enforcement agencies and dedicated private citizens," McCormick said. "The government protected medical patients who deserve their care to be performed by properly credentialed and experienced providers, and the False Claims Act worked as designed by returning much-needed taxpayer dollars to the U.S. Treasury."
Contact: Brian McCormick 215 231-3740
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SOURCE Ross Feller Casey, LLP
