A few years back, my wife was finishing up classes to become a cardiovascular technician. Part of the process to become fully certified is kind of a chicken/egg scenario - to become ARDMS certified, you need to work under a cardiologist for a year - but most cardiologists don't want to hire someone that isn't already ARDMS certified. Anyhow - she was pretty frustrated in how hard it was becoming to get a foot in to the industry when she finally heard back from one practice. The interview is conducted in an apartment on the 50th floor of a luxury building in downtown Manhattan - there were a few other people there just doing work on laptops. She gets the job, but she immediately felt something was off - but she wasn't sure what.
For the most part she would help in the "office" and do billing and coding from some other offices this doctor owned. Sometimes she would be sent out to one of these offices to actually scan people (which is what she actually enjoyed and wanted to be doing). And sometimes the doctor would take the whole team of people working in the "office" out to very fancy dinners where no expense was spared.
A few months (I think it was about 6 months - but could be wrong) in to this job, my wife needed a day off for her own doctors appointment, and it turned out to be a good day to take off - the office was raided by a joint task force of the FBI and Secret Service - they took the main guy in to custody, confiscated all the laptops, etc. My wife got a call later that afternoon from one of the other girls telling her what happened. Eventually my wife was asked to come in to talk with the FBI twice - they had pictures of her outside of the building smoking - knew what she had eaten at one of the dinners, etc. She was cleared from any involvement since she really had no clue what was actually happening.
In the end, the guy was arrested for Medicare and Medicaid fraud - he had purchased a radiological service from a doctor that was retiring, and assumed that doctors identity. He was charged with billing out $32 million in services that were never performed - $20M to Medicaid, $12M to Medicare. It definitely seems they were on to him for a little while at least - though I can't find any more details besides the original press regarding his arrest.
Sadly, my wife lost this time and does not feel right putting it on her resume - so she remained in the chicken and egg scenario and eventually she went back to school to broaden her applicable skills so she can actually work in the field - and hopefully, actually get that certification...
A few years back, my wife was finishing up classes to become a cardiovascular technician. Part of the process to become fully certified is kind of a chicken/egg scenario - to become ARDMS certified, you need to work under a cardiologist for a year - but most cardiologists don't want to hire someone that isn't already ARDMS certified. Anyhow - she was pretty frustrated in how hard it was becoming to get a foot in to the industry when she finally heard back from one practice. The interview is conducted in an apartment on the 50th floor of a luxury building in downtown Manhattan - there were a few other people there just doing work on laptops. She gets the job, but she immediately felt something was off - but she wasn't sure what.
For the most part she would help in the "office" and do billing and coding from some other offices this doctor owned. Sometimes she would be sent out to one of these offices to actually scan people (which is what she actually enjoyed and wanted to be doing). And sometimes the doctor would take the whole team of people working in the "office" out to very fancy dinners where no expense was spared.
A few months (I think it was about 6 months - but could be wrong) in to this job, my wife needed a day off for her own doctors appointment, and it turned out to be a good day to take off - the office was raided by a joint task force of the FBI and Secret Service - they took the main guy in to custody, confiscated all the laptops, etc. My wife got a call later that afternoon from one of the other girls telling her what happened. Eventually my wife was asked to come in to talk with the FBI twice - they had pictures of her outside of the building smoking - knew what she had eaten at one of the dinners, etc. She was cleared from any involvement since she really had no clue what was actually happening.
In the end, the guy was arrested for Medicare and Medicaid fraud - he had purchased a radiological service from a doctor that was retiring, and assumed that doctors identity. He was charged with billing out $32 million in services that were never performed - $20M to Medicaid, $12M to Medicare. It definitely seems they were on to him for a little while at least - though I can't find any more details besides the original press regarding his arrest.
Sadly, my wife lost this time and does not feel right putting it on her resume - so she remained in the chicken and egg scenario and eventually she went back to school to broaden her applicable skills so she can actually work in the field - and hopefully, actually get that certification...