Miami Medicare Fraud Lawyer

Miami is unfortunately a hotbed for Medicare fraud. With its large senior population and concentration of healthcare providers, scammers often target Miami seniors through fraudulent Medicare schemes. Having an experienced Miami Medicare fraud lawyer can be crucial for protecting your rights if you are being investigated or charged.

Some common Medicare scams in Miami include:

• Billing for services never performed: This involves a healthcare provider billing Medicare for medical services, tests, or procedures that were never actually done.
• Upcoding: When a healthcare provider bills Medicare for a more expensive service than was actually performed. For example, billing for a 1-hour doctor visit when the patient was only seen for 15 minutes.
• Kickbacks: A healthcare provider receives money or gifts in exchange for patient referrals or ordering specific services. This is illegal under the Anti-Kickback Statute.
• Prescription fraud: Billing Medicare for unnecessary medications or prescriptions that patients never receive.
• Identity theft: Using a Medicare beneficiary’s personal information to bill Medicare without their knowledge.
• Equipment scams: Billing Medicare for unnecessary medical equipment that is never provided or not medically needed.

If charged with Medicare fraud, key defenses a knowledgeable lawyer may use include:

• Arguing the incident was an accident or mistake, not intentional deception.
• The defendant acted in good faith according to their understanding of complicated Medicare rules.
• There were mitigating circumstances like poor training of employees or lack of proper compliance programs.
• Medicare rules related to billing or coding are ambiguous and reasonable people can interpret them differently.
• The defendant made efforts to pay back overpayments once errors were discovered.
• The statute of limitations has expired and too much time has passed since alleged incidents occurred.
• The auditors’ extrapolation methodology for estimating total damages is flawed.
• Constitutional violations occurred in how evidence was gathered or patients’ privacy rights were infringed upon.

When facing Medicare fraud charges, your freedom, finances, and professional reputation are all at grave risk. Having an experienced legal advocate can make all the difference. Miami Medicare fraud attorneys have in-depth knowledge of federal healthcare laws and experience defending these complex cases. Don’t wait to seek out skilled legal representation – it could be the difference between avoiding jail time or devastating penalties versus a favorable resolution to your case.