Sunday, September 30, 2012

NBC Bay Area | Los Angeles Man Tied to Series of Fraud Cases Sentenced in Medicare Scheme




A Los Angeles man was sentenced to six years in prison last week for his role in a power wheelchair scam, topping what prosecutors say has been a series of Medicare fraud cases.

David James Garrison, 50, a former physician assistant, was found guilty by a federal jury for his role in submitting $18.9 million in fraudulent Medicare claims for power wheelchairs and other equipment.
The wheelchair case is the third time Garrison has been accused of Medicare fraud. In 2009, Garrison pleaded no contest to tax evasion for his role in what prosecutors described as a fraudulent medical clinic. He pleaded not guilty in October to charges that he forged prescriptions as part of an OxyContin ring that sold 1 million pills on the streets. That case is ongoing. Garrison's attorney did not return a call for comment about the cases.

Garrison's physician assistant license lapsed in 2009, said Russ Heimerich, a spokesman for the Department of Consumer Affairs, which oversees many state licensing boards. He said the board examined the tax evasion case and did not see it as grounds for discipline.

According to court documents, Garrison's cases involved the use of “cappers” or “marketers” who recruited Medicare beneficiaries to submit to unneeded care or hand over their personal information. That information was used to bill the program for medications, services or supplies that the patients didn’t need.
In the wheelchair case, prosecuted by the Los Angeles U.S. attorney's office, one witness testified that  marketers had to recruit beneficiaries as far as 300 miles from Los Angeles because so many local people had already been used in other fraud schemes.

In the first health fraud case linked to Garrison, he was described as an “at large” suspect in October 2007 when then-Attorney General Jerry Brown announced arrests in a $1.5 million health fraud scam. "The suspects create a fake healthcare clinic to line their own pockets rather than help the sick and elderly," a 2007 statement from Brown said.

In that case, Garrison was accused of ordering medically unnecessary diagnostic tests at Scott Medical Center in Burbank, where he had worked since 2003. Medicare and Medi-Cal beneficiaries were recruited to go to the clinic, where expensive tests were ordered and billed to the government.
Garrison pleaded no contest to tax evasion in 2009 related to his earnings from the clinic.

When federal authorities arrested Garrison in the wheelchair scam in 2010, he was also charged for keeping a .357 handgun in an unlocked hatbox near the front door of his Inglewood apartment. Garrison pleaded no contest in 2010 to being a felon in possession of a firearm.  Heimerich said while the gun case was prosecuted by the state, it arose from a federal arrest that did not trigger a notice to the physician assistant licensing board. Also, he said a state court clerk was required to notify the board but did not. During a two-week trial, evidence showed that Garrison worked at Van Nuys and Los Angeles clinics where he wrote prescriptions and ordered tests on behalf of six doctors, including one whose photo he couldn't identify. With Garrison’s prescriptions in hand, co-defendant Edward Aslanyan sold them for $1,000 to $1,500 to owners of about 50 different medical equipment firms. The medical supply companies used the prescriptions to buy the chairs from wholesalers for about $900, then billed Medicare for up to $5,000 per chair.

The hefty profit margins have made the wheelchairs a major target for Medicare fraud throughout the U.S. Garrison and Aslanyan wrote and sold the prescriptions from March 2007 to September 2008, prosecutors said. A jury found Garrison guilty of conspiracy to commit health care fraud, six counts of health care fraud and one count of aggravated identity theft. Aslanyan pleaded guilty to his role in the scam and was sentenced to six years in prison as well.

According to Assistant U.S. Attorney David Kirman, the medical equipment firms included one run by a pastor, Christopher Iruke, who relied on members of the Arms of Grace Christian Center to perpetuate Medicare fraud. Court documents show that two Garrison acquaintances told a defense investigator that he was their children's track and field coach and was honest and well-liked. One parent said Garrison's "integrity is unshakable."

In November, Garrison faces trial on drug charges related to a clinic that allegedly forged prescriptions for the addictive and powerful painkiller OxyContin, which was sold on the street for up to $30 per pill. Prosecutors say he worked there from the summer of 2009 to February 2010. He has pleaded not guilty.
In that case, federal prosecutors allege that Garrison worked as a physician assistantat an Eighth Street clinic in Los Angeles where recruiters offered Medicare and Medi-Cal patients cash or free medical care to go to the clinic. There, Garrison and others met briefly with patients and issued prescriptions of 90 top-strength OxyContin pills. Other members of the alleged drug ring went with the patients to obtain the pills from pharmacies and gave them to another man who sold them on the street.
Garrison told investigators that he issued the prescriptions if he felt the patients needed pain medications or had been taking OxyContin.

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

Asian frogs becoming extinct before they can be identified, biologists warn


 from:  guardian.co.ukFiona Harvey in Jeju, South Korea

Scientists fear amphibian destruction will be disastrous, with many species disappearing uncatalogued.

Frogs and other amphibians are being wiped out at such a rapid rate across Asia that many are going extinct before scientists even have a chance to identify them as new species, biologists warned at an international conservation meeting in South Korea this week.
The scale of the destruction – caused by habitat loss, disease, pollution and other factors – is hard to quantify, but scientists fear the result will be disastrous. Amphibians have been suffering a wave of devastation all around the world, in part because of the spread of the fungal disease Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis, known as BD or chytrid fungus, which has wiped out whole populations within the space of a few years.

But while conservation and monitoring efforts have so far focused on the Americas and Europe, little work has yet been done in the world's most populous continent, with the result that many amphibian species there are as yet uncatalogued and unstudied. For instance, according to one researcher, there are probably at least three to four times as many amphibian species in India alone as are currently catalogued.

Frogs and other amphibians are among the most threatened creatures in the world today – globally, at least a third, probably 40%, of amphibian species are in urgent danger of extinction, making a total of more than 2,000 species of amphibian so far documented to be officially "threatened", "endangered" or "vulnerable", classifications used by scientists to describe the level of threat. "This is higher than any other terrestrial animal," said Jaime GarcĂ­a-Moreno, executive director of the Amphibian Survival Alliance.

The plight of frogs and other amphibians is of particular concern to scientists because many think the devastation afflicting them could be a foretaste of that in waiting for other creatures. Their physiognomy makes amphibians particularly sensitive to small changes in their environment, including temperature changes such as global warming, and to water and air pollution.

This sensitivity, some scientists believe, could be behind the sudden and unexpected extinction of certain species even from well-protected areas. Waldman pointed to the golden toad of Costa Rica which "disappeared from a pristine habitat".

Scientists could also learn more about the deadly chytrid disease from studying Asia, noted Mi-Sook Min, research professor at Seoul National University. Some indicators suggest the disease could even have come from the continent, as most cases to date have been found in other continents which may indicate a long history in Asia whereby amphibians have evolved to live with the disease. However, there are also indications in other research that the disease could have been existing in Latin America since the 1880s.
The scientists, presenting their work at the World Conservation Congress, the quadrennial meeting of the International Union for Conservation of Nature, in Jeju this week, called for more research into amphibians in Asia as a matter of urgency.

Thursday, September 13, 2012

Samsung, Sony renew rivalry in medical devices


From: KoreaTimes written by Cho Mu-hyun

After trading blows over the last two decades for supremacy in the consumer electronics market, Samsung Electronics and Sony are set to continue their rivalry in the new arena of medical devices.

Only a decade ago, the Japanese company led almost every sector in the information technology industry while its Korean competitor trailed behind trying to catch up. Now, Samsung finds itself ahead in major markets such as smartphones and other consumer electronic goods. It remains to be seen whether Sony can strike back in the medical equipment market, where it’s experience and sophistication in optical technology and systems could provide an advantage. Both firms are planning aggressive investment in the business during the second half of the year.

Following a change of leadership from Howard Stringer to Kazuo Hirai in April, Sony has been vocal about its intentions to find new growth engines, one of them being the medical business. New CEO Hirai said during his inauguration press conference on April 11 that the company plans to make the medical sector a “business worth 100 billion yen ($1.25 billion) in the mid- and long-term.”According to statements released on the same day, Sony has set a sales target of 50 billion yen ($629 million) for its 2014 fiscal-year. It is planning to purchase 58.18 percent share of subsidiary Sony Entertainment, which in turn holds 55.19 percent of M3, a medical service provider. The main motivation behind the purchase is to take managerial control of M3.

Out of some 280,000 doctors based in Japan, around 200,000 are reportedly subscribed to an Internet information service offered by M3.

The Japanese firm is also planning to buy shares of Shinjuku-based lens maker Olympus, which saw its stock price plummet after admitting guilt to the biggest accounting fraud in the country’s history. Olympus makes the best endoscopes in the world, a must-have business for Sony in order to successfully venture into the medical arena.The electronics maker has seen a fourth consecutive fiscal-year loss, which it attributed to last year’s floods in Thailand that hampered its supply chain there, the global recession and a strong yen. It posted a record loss of $5.7 billion for the financial year that ended in March.

It has been trying to find leeway outside its electronics division, its established mainstay business, especially from Sony Pictures. Though Hirai vowed to regenerate the company’s television business to its “former glory,” the sector is currently dominated by the world’s biggest television manufacturer Samsung.
The Korean firm toppled Sony in 2006 and has been the top television maker for 26 straight quarters, according to research agency DisplaySearch. The agency said it had a global market share of 28.5 percent in terms of revenue. Samsung posted a record quarterly profit for the second quarter of $5.9 billion thanks to skyrocketing smartphone sales. But the company is leaving no stone unturned and has chosen medical equipment and biologics among five new key growth engines (the others being solar energy, car batteries and light emitting diode display panels) that together could bring in 50 trillion won ($44.1 billion) in revenue by 2020. The group acquired medical equipment maker Medison and renamed it Samsung Medison, and recently absorbed eight of its subsidiaries based overseas into the one here. The outfit is speculated to be looking into merging companies making equipment for magnetic resonance imaging and computed tomography.

“Samsung is considering various ways to expand into the medical business as we have chosen it as one of our new growth engines,” said a Samsung spokesman. He declined to comment on specifics of which companies in what country the group is looking into buying. The spokesman said that Samsung will manufacturer X-ray computed tomography equipment while Samsung Medison will make magnetic resonance imaging machines.

Wednesday, September 12, 2012

Doctors still trying to diagnose mysteries of hantavirus

The CDC has tracked every case of hantavirus pulmonary syndrome across the U.S. since it was first identified in the country in 1993. That year, 48 people became ill. From 1994 to 2011, an average of 28 people got the disease each year. Above, a researcher from the University of New Mexico, shown in this 1996 photo, weighs a mouse caught in traps during a study of hantavirus. (Paul Bearce, Associated Press /January 1, 1996).

By Kate Mather and Anna Gorman, Los Angeles Times


Nearly 20 years after hantavirus was first identified in the U.S., doctors are under pressure to quickly learn more about the pervasive and deadly disease.

In his 30-plus years as a doctor, Bruce Tempest had never seen anything like it.
A Navajo man having trouble breathing showed up at the emergency room of a small hospital in Gallup, N.M. Less than an hour later, he was dead. The man had been young, athletic and otherwise healthy. His fiancee had died days before, also from sudden breathing problems.
"This is something different," Tempest, now 76, remembered thinking of the 1993 illnesses. "It just doesn't fit."
Tempest contacted area doctors, looking for other cases. Then he asked the University of New Mexico for help. Soon, the patients were being airlifted to Albuquerque. They arrived with chills and aches but soon were in complete respiratory distress. Physicians were at a loss: Was it sepsis?Influenza? Bubonic plague?
Doctors had confronted a medical mystery, and they knew it had to be solved quickly. Patients were showing up at the hospital "not feeling well one day and being dead the next," said Gregory Glass, an epidemiologist at Johns Hopkins University.
When the cases hit television, a lucky clue came in. A doctor called and said the illness sounded a lot like a virus he had observed in Korea in the 1950s. It was called hantavirus.
This summer's hantavirus outbreak in Yosemite National Park has served as a sobering reminder: Mystery still surrounds the disease.
"The biggest mystery is we don't have a good explanation," said Barbara Knust, a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention epidemiologist. "For Yosemite, why this year of all years is there an increased number of cases?"
Nearly 20 years after being identified in the U.S., hantavirus is better understood but no less vexing. Researchers now know it causes hantavirus pulmonary syndrome, a severerespiratory disease. It is transmitted through the droppings and urine of deer mice, and not through person-to-person contact. Treated early, patients have a better chance of survival. But there is no cure, and more than one-third of patients die.
The Yosemite cases follow the pattern: Three of the eight visitors who fell ill died. Officials have called the outbreak unprecedented — more than one hantavirus infection from the same location in the same year is very rare.
The National Park Service has closed the cabins believed to be at the heart of the outbreak. State and federal scientists are scouring the park, trapping mice and conducting laboratory tests. Public health officials are warning doctors worldwide to watch for possible symptoms, which can be confused with the flu and can take weeks to show up.
And the California Department of Public Health said the risk of new cases remains, even as the summer surge of visitors wanes....moreover

Thursday, September 6, 2012

Asia Ends Down, China Hits March 2009 Lows


Asian shares edged down in choppy trade on Monday, encouraged by a fresh report of a potential framework for the European Central Bank's new bond buying scheme, as well as hopes of a strong easing from the Federal Reserve.

Central bank sources told Reuters on Friday that the ECB is considering setting yield band targets under the bond-buying program to shield its strategy from speculators, but the decision would not be made before its Sept. 6 policy meeting.

There is a dearth of major economic data in Asia on Monday, meaning the market's focus in the short-term will remain fixed on Europe, with longer-term focus on the annual U.S. Jackson Hole meeting of central bankers and economists later this week.

The FTSE CNBC Asia 100 Index [.FTFCNBCA  6030.29     58.37  (+0.98%)], which measures markets across Asia, slipped 0.7 percent.

Seoul stocks edged down slightly as Samsung shares slumped after a U.S. court ruled against Samsung Electronics in a smartphone patent claim by Apple [AAPL  676.27     6.04  (+0.9%)                ].

The slump offset news that rating agency Moody's had upgraded South Korea's credit rating to match those of China and Japan.

Samsung Electronics closed down 7.5 percent, its largest single-session drop since Oct 2008 that wiped $12 billion from its market capitalization since Friday.

Other group companies included in Samsung's smartphone manufacturing value chain were also hit, with Samsung C&T Corp, Samsung Electro-Mechanics, and Samsung SDI all down 1 to 6 percent.

write ups from  Reuters with CNBC.com

Tuesday, September 4, 2012

Researchers build software to map criminal networks


ItNews | Phone calls, social networks on the radar - Sydney researchers are developing an open source tool that could allow security professionals to detect and visualise unusual behaviours in two dimensions.
Called GEOMI (Geometry for Maximum Insight), the Java-based tool has been under development at the faculty since 2005, with version 2 released last year.
Sydney University professor Seok-Hee Hong said the tool could be used to analyse complex relationships in social networks, email and phone records.
By presenting information as two-dimensional visuals, she said the tool could allow police and security specialists to look for various relationships and abnormal behaviour, such as 'short cycles'.
The term 'short cycle' refers to chains of connections that loop back to the original source in only three or four steps.
Hong described GEOMI as a research prototype and generic visual analytics tool that had yet to be commercialised for specific domains.
Besides law enforcement, the tool could also be used to map biological networks -- including protein-protein interaction, gene regulatory networks and biochemical pathways.
Hong said GEOMI algorithms were "superfast", capable of running in "O(n log n) time [compared to] existing ones [in] O(n2) time, where n represents the size of the graph".
Earlier this month, the New Zealand Police agreed to commercialise its Environment for Virtualised Evidence (EVE) technology, used to mine seized electronic devices like mobile phones and PCs for clues.

*GEOMI used to detect viruses in in an email network.

source: from the article of Juha Saarinen on Itnews

Sunday, September 2, 2012

Briefs: New Scientist - Chicago Tribune


originally posted on: chicago tribune
First Case of Alleged Stem-Cell Fraud Enters US Courts

Six people in the U.S. are suing biotech company RNL Bio for alleged fraud over controversial stem-cell treatments
The days of "stem-cell tourism" could be numbered. Six residents of Los Angeles are suing South Korean company RNL Bio and associates in a California court for alleged fraud. They claim the company convinced them to travel to clinics in South Korea, China or Mexico to donate fat tissue and have stem cells from it re-administered to cure diseases and even reverse aging.
Stem cells hold great medical promise, but only one treatment is licensed in the U.S. and that is for a rare blood disorder. Others are experimental and it is illegal to offer them commercially. Yet some companies tout stem-cell "cures" that are carried out outside the U.S. RNL Bio calls its fat-tissue stem cells "safe technologies" for treating various disorders.
There have been protests against these treatments for years, but this is the first civil lawsuit for damages, says Paul Knoepfler of the University of California-Davis. It "serves notice to the purveyors of unproven stem-cell treatments" that they may face litigation if they market in the U.S., says Bernard Siegel of the Genetics Policy Institute, a stem-cell watchdog in Palm Beach, Fla.