LOS ANGELES—A Beverly Hills plastic surgeon, his son, medical practices and billing company have agreed to pay $23.9 million to resolve allegations that they violated federal law by submitting or causing the submission of false claims to both Medicare and Medicaid, officials announced April 28.
The settlement resolves allegations that Dr. Joel Aronowitz, Daniel Aronowitz, and other entities falsified the place of service for skin grafts and billed multiple times for single-use skin substitute products, according to the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ).
The DOJ contends that the parties manipulated the place of service code on claims for skin grafts to fraudulently maximize reimbursement from Medicare and Medicaid. The department further alleges that Dr. Aronowitz failed to properly dispose of unused portions of single-use skin graft materials and, instead, used them in later procedures involving other Medicare and Medicaid beneficiaries, resulting in thousands of instances of double billing.
“Our investigation revealed a long-running practice to illegally maximize profits, ultimately costing public health programs millions of dollars,” U.S. Attorney Martin Estrada said in a statement.
“The Medicare and Medicaid programs are taxpayer-funded programs, and we are committed to wiping out abuses that line the pockets of unscrupulous providers.”
The department said that in connection with the settlement, the government negotiated the voluntary exclusion of Dr. Aronowitz and Tower Multi-Specialty Medical Group from Medicare, Medicaid, and all other federal healthcare programs for a period of 15 years. Daniel Aronowitz will be excluded for three years.
Medicaid is funded jointly by the states and the federal government. The state of California paid for a portion of the Medicaid claims at issue and will receive a total of $497,619 from the settlement.
The civil settlement includes the resolution of claims brought under the qui tam, or whistleblower, provisions of the False Claims Act by parties that worked for Dr. Aronowitz and his associated medical practices and businesses: TDP, a billing company, Dr. Jason Morris, a podiatrist, and Harold Bautista, a billing department employee, according to the DOJ.
Under the qui tam provisions, a private party can file an action on behalf of the government and receive a portion of any recovery.
