Inspector General Finds CMS Pays Twice for Some Drugs

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services sometimes pays twice for drugs, the HHS Office of the Inspector General reported.

The OIG sampled 200 Medicare Part D records from 2016 and found that hospices would also have paid for the drugs in 86 of the records. As a result, CMS paid for the drugs twice — under the Part A hospice benefit and under Part D.

The OIG’s audit was a follow-up to a report in June 2012, which found that Medicare Part D paid $33.6 million and hospice beneficiaries paid $3.8 million for drugs that likely should have been paid by hospice organizations.