Federal prosecutors at the U.S. Justice Department have included a case involving a heart health screening program for student athletes in the department's latest "health care fraud takedown" announcement.
Most of the takedown announcement cases involve Medicaid plans, Medicare plans and federal employee plans, but DOJ officials said one of the defendants listed, Dr. Jason Finkelstein, sent claims to employer-sponsored health plans and providers of individual and family health coverage, as well as to government plans.
Finkelstein is a board-certified, Fort Worth, Texas-based cardiologist who served as the medical director of a cardiovascular testing company.
The company used "marketing tactics designed to prey on fears that student athletes could die from sudden cardiac arrest" and "the payment of kickbacks and bribes to athletic directors and others," according to a criminal indictment filed June 16 in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida.
The screening program had questionable value, and the reviewers "did not conduct a meaningful review of the tests and rubber stamped the tests as 'normal,'" according to the indictment.
Finkelstein rushed through evaluations of 63 images in October 2024 and missed evidence of heart abnormalities in the images of the heart of one student, prosecutors said.
"Approximately 24 days later, the student died from sudden cardiac arrest while exercising with his basketball team," according to the Justice Department's summary of the case. "Even though Finkelstein was informed of the student's death, Finkelstein did not change his practice of signing and approving the cardiovascular test results without meaningfully reviewing them."
Finkelstein has not yet appeared in court.
Finkelstein and Justice Department officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
© Arc, All Rights Reserved. Request academic re-use from www.copyright.com. All other uses, submit a request to TMSalesOperations@arc-network.com. For more information visit Asset & Logo Licensing.