The former chief compliance officer of ChristianaCare Health System will receive more than $12 million as part of a settlement addressing his allegations of kickbacks and other False Claims Act (FCA) violations at the Delaware-based hospital network.
Ronald Sherman served as CCO at ChristianaCare from 2007-14. He filed a qui tam lawsuit against the hospital network in April 2017 in U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware.
On Dec. 21, a $47.1 million settlement agreement entered into by ChristianaCare was executed, according to court filings.
The lawsuit alleged ChristianaCare provided free services, including professional care by its nurse practitioners and physician assistants, to nonemployee doctors in exchange for patient referrals. By doing so, it “raked in millions of dollars in hospital bills paid by government healthcare programs, including Medicaid and Medicare,” said a press release from law firm Walden Macht & Haran, which represented Sherman.
“To my knowledge, this is the first FCA settlement—ever—based on a hospital allegedly providing private physicians with free services in the form of hospital-employed nurse practitioners and physician assistants,” said lead counsel Dan Miller in the release. “Any other hospital in the country that operates under the model that led to this settlement should consider changing its practices immediately or risk a whistleblower lawsuit.”
The settlement total is believed to be the largest under the FCA in Delaware...
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