A False Claims Act lawsuit involving alleged kickbacks for placing drugs on formularies has been settled for $12.5 million. The case is instructive because it shows the False Claims Act can apply even when the government has not lost money from the alleged violations.

A healthcare organization’s Medicare Bundled Payments for Care Improvement Advanced (BCPI Advanced) program resulted in lower hospital readmission rates. The program reduced readmission rates from 30% to 19%.

The cuts could hurt several healthcare sectors at a time when the COVID-19 pandemic has taken a heavy financial toll.

A recent study of Medicare data revealed facilities have many opportunities to improve readmissions — to either a medical or psychiatric hospital — after psychiatric hospitalization.

The authors estimated ambulatory surgery centers could reduce program costs by another $73.4 billion from 2019 to 2028.

In April, CMS unveiled “Hospitals Without Walls,” a COVID-19 pandemic-specific policy likely to affect both hospitals and surgery centers. It provides a path for a Medicare-approved ASC to change its status to a hospital, thus allowing just about any Medicare-approved procedure permitted in a hospital to be performed in a surgery center — and at hospital reimbursement rates.