Healthcare fraud is nothing new, but that just means scammers have to get more creative. Urinary catheters are not on a lot of people’s minds, making them a prime target for fraud.

Here’s the scam:

Medicare enrollees are targeted with a phone call or email. They are offered free equipment, or gift cards to use for free equipment, in exchange for answering “a few questions about themselves”, such as name, date of birth, and other identifying information, in what seems to be some sort of innocuous survey. It is anything but.

The scammers take the personal details they’ve harvested from the Medicare enrollee and voila: Medicare starts getting bills for medically unnecessary urinary catheters, sometimes without ever delivering the equipment to the beneficiaries, and often without their knowledge.

Oddly, Medicare spending on urinary catheters skyrocketed from $200 million in recent years, ballooning to a jaw-dropping $2 billion in 2023 alone! Are urinary catheters suddenly cool? All the rage after that star-studded urinary catheter Superbowl ad? Viral on TikTok? Doubtful. Fraud is the likely culprit, especially with the amount of money to be made

This is where you come in. Medicare's enforcement works on a pay-and-chase. They pay claims upfront, then track down fraudsters later. This keeps the system functioning and allows Medicare beneficiaries to get services quickly and conveniently. This means you, the potential whistleblower, are the government’s key to tracking down fraud.

If you've got an inside scoop on Medicare fraud involving urinary catheters or targeting Medicare dollars in other ways, don't hesitate to reach out to a Whistleblower Partner.