Massachusetts Physician Arrested and Indicted for Kickbacks from Warner Chilcott

Last week, in addition to the President of Warner Chilcott being arrested and the company pleading guilty to Medicare fraud, in a related case a Springfield, MA gynecologist was arrested in connection with allegedly accepting free meals and speaker fees from a pharmaceutical company in return for prescribing its osteoporosis drugs, allowing pharmaceutical sales representatives to access patient records, and lying to federal investigators. Rita Luthra, M.D., of Longmeadow, Massachusetts, was indicted on one count of violating the Anti-Kickback Statute, one count of wrongful disclosure of individually identifiable health information, and one count of obstructing a criminal health care investigation by lying to federal agents and directing an employee to do the same. The indictment also seeks $23,500 in criminal forfeiture. Criminal forfeiture is an action brought as a part of a criminal prosecution of the defendant and requires that the government indict the property used or derived from the crime, along with the defendant. According to court documents, Warner Chilcott, a pharmaceutical company, allegedly paid Rita Luthra $23,500 to prescribe its osteoporosis drugs (Actonel and Atelvia) from October 2010 through November 2011. On thirty-one occasions, a Warner Chilcott representative allegedly brought food to Luthra's medical office for her and her staff, and paid $750 to speak with Luthra for roughly thirty minutes, while she ate. Warner Chilcott also...
Source: Policy and Medicine - Category: American Health Authors: Source Type: blogs