Seven Texas doctors and a hospital executive have agreed to pay a total of $1,106,449 to resolve False Claims Act allegations involving illegal remuneration in violation of the Anti-Kickback Statute and Stark Law, and to cooperate with the Department’s investigations of and litigation against other parties. The settlements resolve allegations that seven Texas doctors received thousands of dollars in illegal remuneration from eight management service organizations (MSOs) in exchange for ordering laboratory tests from Rockdale Hospital d/b/a Little River Healthcare (Little River), True Health Diagnostics LLC (True Health), and Boston Heart Diagnostics Corporation (Boston Heart). Little River allegedly funded the illegal remuneration to the doctors, in the form of volume-based commissions paid to independent contractor recruiters, who used MSOs to pay numerous doctors for their referrals. The MSO payments to the doctors were allegedly disguised as investment returns but in fact were based on, and offered in exchange for, the doctors’ referrals.
