ResMed Corp., a manufacturer of durable medical equipment (DME) based in San Diego, California, has agreed to pay more than $37.5 million to resolve alleged False Claims Act violations for paying kickbacks to DME suppliers, sleep labs and other health care providers, the Department of Justice announced today.
“Paying any type of illegal remuneration to induce patient referrals undermines the integrity of our nation’s health care system,” said Assistant Attorney General Jody Hunt of the Department of Justice’s Civil Division. “When a patient receives a prescription for a device to treat a health care condition, the patient deserves to know that the device was selected based on quality of care considerations and not on unlawful payments from equipment manufacturers.”
The Anti-Kickback Statute prohibits the knowing and willful payment of any remuneration to induce the referral of services or items that are paid for by a federal healthcare program, such as Medicare, Medicaid or TRICARE. Claims submitted to these programs in violation of the Anti-Kickback Statute give rise to liability under the False Claims Act.
The settlement ends assertions that the company (a) provided DME companies with free telephone call center services and other free patient outreach services that enabled these companies to order resupplies for their patients with sleep apnea, (b) provided sleep labs with free and below-cost positive airway pressure masks and diagnostic machines, as well as free installation of these machines, (c) arranged for, and fully guaranteed the payments due on, interest-free loans that DME supplies acquired from third-party financial institutions for the purchase of ResMed equipment, and (d) provided non-sleep specialist physicians free home sleep testing devices referred to as “ApneaLink.”
ResMed entered into a Corporate Integrity Agreement (CIA) with the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General. The CIA requires, among other things, that ResMed implement additional controls around its product pricing and sales and that ResMed conduct internal and external monitoring of its arrangements with referral sources.
The agreement resolves five lawsuits originally brought by whistleblowers under the qui tam, or whistleblower, provisions of the False Claims. The False Claims Act permits private citizens with knowledge of fraud against the government to bring a lawsuit on behalf of the United States and to share in the recovery. The whistleblowers will collectively receive a roughly $6.2 million share of the settlement.
Jeffrey Newman represents whistleblowers nation-wide. He can be reached at 617-823-3217 or at jeff@jeffnewmanlaw.com
