Hospice company paying $6M in fraudulent billing case

SouthernCare Inc., a hospice-care provider based in Atlanta, has agreed to pay $5.86 million to settle allegations that it violated the False Claims Act from 2009 through 2014 by charging Medicare for hospice care at Pennsylvania facilities that was unneeded, William M. McSwain, the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, said Thursday.

Two whistle-blowers, Dawn Hamrock and Patricia Beegle, will split $1.17 million of the recovery. They alleged in separate lawsuits filed in 2013 that SouthernCare admitted patients into hospice care who were not terminally ill, sometimes treating them for years.

SouthernCare operates Kindred Hospice locations in Blue Bell and Trevose, plus six other location in the state.

The settlement "is neither an admission of liability by SouthernCare nor a concession by the United States that its claims are not well founded.”

An attorney for SouthernCare did not immediately respond to a request for comment.