Audrey Strauss, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, and Scott Lampert, Special Agent in Charge of the US Department of Health and Human Services, Office of Inspector General’s (“HHS-OIG”) New York Region, announced that the civil and criminal healthcare fraud cases against Feng Qin, MD, a vascular surgeon, and his medical practice Qin Medical PC have been resolved. Qin, who practiced in Lower Manhattan and Far Rockaway, Queens, was criminally charged in December 2018 with fraudulently billing Medicare for vascular surgery procedures performed on end-stage renal disease (“ESRD”) patients that were not medically reasonable and necessary or covered under Medicare rules; the United States also filed a civil healthcare fraud complaint against Qin and Qin Medical in December 2018.
Under the approved civil settlement, Qin and Qin Medical agreed to a pay $783,200 to the United States. The State of New York is expected soon to enter into an additional settlement with defendants in the amount of $16,800, for a total recovery of $800,000. The amount is based on the Office’s assessment of the defendants’ ability to pay based on the financial information they provided. As part of the settlement, Qin and Qin Medical admitted and accepted responsibility for conduct alleged by the Government in its civil complaint as further described below.
Qin previously paid $150,000 to settle a prior civil fraud lawsuit filed against him and his previous employer for engaging in fraudulent billing practices during the time period 2010 through 2012. Qin also entered into a Voluntary Exclusion Agreement with HHS-OIG, which prohibits him from participating in Medicare and other federal healthcare programs for four years. This is in addition to the more than two years he has been so excluded since his arrest, as a condition of his bail. The Government has agreed to defer Qin’s criminal prosecution for a period of one year, after which time it will seek to dismiss the charges if Qin abides by the terms of the deferred prosecution agreement.
