Documents reveal unnecessary procedures

• Tweet

MIAMI, Aug. 7 (UPI) -- For-profit chain HCA allegedly knew as early as 2002 unnecessary procedures were taking place at some of its Florida hospitals, internal documents indicate.

Details about the procedures and the company's knowledge of them are contained in thousands of pages of confidential memos, e-mails, hearing transcripts and consultant reports reviewed by the New York Times.

They reveal that some cardiologists at several Florida hospitals owned by HCA were unable to justify many of the procedures they were performing, the Times said.

In a conference call with investors, company executives disclosed Monday that the civil division of the U.S. attorney's office in Miami has requested information on interventional cardiology at 10 of its hospitals, most of them in Florida.

Included on the list is the Cedars Medical Center in Miami that the company no longer owns and the Regional Medical Center Bayonet Point.

In a recent statement, HCA declined to provide evidence that it had alerted Medicare or Medicaid or private insurers of its findings or reimbursed them for any of the procedures that the company later deemed unnecessary, as required by law.

HCA also declined to show that it had ever notified patients, the newspaper said.