Elizabeth L.B. Greene quoted in Part B News "NPPs get hired without licenses, despite exclusion; keep your guard up"

05/04/2023

A no-longer-licensed physician assistant (PA) was hired by a practice and worked as a PA on thousands of cases before being found out, leading to a prison sentence for her and a potential loss of thousands in billings for the practice. The case is a reminder that you have to make sure not only that your clinical workers meet specific licensing requirements, but also that you don’t let them veer out of compliance and put you and your patients at risk.

While the Pickering case is particularly egregious, circumstances have made it easier for a similar slip-up than it used to be, says Elizabeth L.B. Greene of Mirick O’Connell in Worcester, Mass.

“There is a shortage of medical providers across the country, which may make some practices more likely to bring on providers more quickly, in an effort to ease the burdens on their overworked providers and support their patients,” Greene says.

Greene adds that fraud schemes, including fraudulent credentials, “have become increasingly easy to obtain and difficult to ferret out” in recent years, adding to the danger.