The Department of Justice announced last week that Encompass Health Corporation, formerly known as HealthSouth Corporation, has agreed to pay $48 million to resolve allegations that it was enrolling patients in its program and charging Medicare whether they would benefit from rehab or not. The DOJ called the company nation’s largest operator of inpatient rehabilitation facilities.

The qui tam cases were brought by a former company physician in Florida, the head of therapy at a Texas facility and the medical director at a Virginia hospital.

From the DOJ press release:

The government alleged that beginning in 2007, in order to ensure compliance with Medicare’s rules regarding classification as an (inpatient rehabilitation facility) IRF, and to increase Medicare reimbursement, some Encompass IRFs falsely diagnosed patients with what they referred to as “disuse myopathy” when there was no clinical evidence for this diagnosis. Additionally, Encompass IRFs allegedly admitted patients who were not eligible for admission to an IRF because they were too sick or disabled to participate in or benefit from intensive inpatient therapy.Continue Reading Qui tam cases against once-notorious rehab hospital chain result in $48 million settlement, lots of spin.