The federal government will get $6.4 million for an investigative effort to keep a Malvern heart monitoring firm in code. BioTelemetry recently agreed to pay the sum to settle charges that it billed Medicare and other federal healthcare programs for remote patient heart monitoring when only less-expensive, office-based services were reimbursable, according to an mHealthNews report.

“Billing for a higher-level service that is not necessary to treat a patient’s condition to receive higher reimbursement from federal healthcare programs will not be tolerated,” Acting Justice Department Civil Division Assistant Attorney General Benjamin C. Mizer said in the article. “Such conduct wastes critical federal healthcare program funds and drives up the costs of healthcare for all of us.”

The accusations targeted the use of the company’s CardioNet mobile cardiac outpatient telemetry on patients who had suffered mild or moderate heart issues.

Read more about the charges and the government’s warning to all healthcare providers to meet its ethical standards in mHealthNews here.
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