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Home Health & Hospice Week

Kickbacks:

Reconsider Your Online Referral Subscription

Published on Wed Apr 27, 2011

OIG gives thumbs down to referral software. Home care providers feeling cornered by hospitals' use of online referral software that requires a subscription are happy to see a new OIG Advisory Opinion condemning the process as potentially generating kickbacks. But don't expect to see such software disappear overnight. In an Advisory Opinion posted May 20, the HHS Office of Inspector General considers a situation where a company charges hospitals and postacute providers including home care for "an online referral service ... whereby post-acute care providers would pay a fee to electronically receive and respond to referral requests from hospitals for post-discharge care." In the particular case considered by the OIG, the software company is currently charging hospitals for the software, and plans to start charging the postacute providers. If the providers don't pay to belong to the service, they will be listed in the company's system but wouldn't be able [...]
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