It's been a busy week here and way too much of it was spent answering phone calls that turned out to be spam callers trying to send me something I absolutely don't want. A lot of them ask for me by name, then say they're with "Medicare Providers" or some name that sounds kinda official and connected to my actual medical insurance. They actually have nothing to do with Medicare. What they seek in these calls — which I assume they're recording — is to get me to okay them sending me some piece of medical equipment. I usually cut them off pretty quickly but sometimes I play along for a minute or so.
They tell me their records — which allegedly include info from some unnamed doctor I see — say that I have some condition. Usually, when I let them get as far as this part of the call, they say it's back trouble and that this unnamed doctor of mine wants me to receive, at absolutely no cost to me, a back brace. The problem with that: I absolutely do not have back trouble nor would any of my doctors think I do. Still, if I say "Okay" and verify my shipping address, they'll send me this thing and then, I'm pretty sure, bill Medicare some very large sum of money. Sometimes, it's not a back brace. Sometimes, it's a blood sugar monitor or a piece of exercise equipment.
I say no pretty firmly, whereupon they hang up. More often actually, I don't let them get that far. Right off, I say, "You are not with Medicare" and they either hang up or argue a bit and then hang up…or I hang up. So far, no one has shipped me anything but these calls inspired me to carefully study the statements I receive from the genuine Medicare folks. In the last few months, I've reported four different instances where the Medicare statement says I received some sort of medical equipment (which I never got). Or they claim I underwent sort of test (which I never took) from some provider I never heard of and which is usually located far off in another state.
In the most recent statement, Medicare was billed by a medical supply company in North Carolina for a "lumbar-sacral orthosis, sagittal-coronal control, with rigid anterior and posterior frame panels." I don't know what that is but I do know I never got one of them things.
Oh, wait. I just thought to Google it and I found the above photo and this definition: "A lumbar-sacral orthosis is a type of back brace designed to support and stabilize the lower spine, specifically from the sacrococcygeal junction to the T-9 vertebra. It features rigid panels and frames that control the movement of the spine in multiple directions, helping to reduce pain and promote healing." Yeah…a back brace.
So that's what it is and like I said, I've never received or needed one. The firm in Norh Carolina allegedly supplied this to me last June and then, according to the statement I received, billed Medicare $1,963.00 for it. This was above the allowable amount for one of these so Medicare paid them $1,089.30.
By the way, I'm pleased that reporting these cases never takes long. I intend to keep doing this even though I have yet to hear the disposition of any of these matters thus far reported
. What I'm kinda curious to know is if the outfits that have been paid for bogus claims of goods and services to me are the same folks who call me claiming to be "Medicare Providers" or "Medicare Consultants" or somesuch name. I never authorized any of them to send me anything and they didn't…but maybe they submitted claims anyway.
I'll let you know if I learn anything. In the meantime, speaking of bogus scams, here's this one more time…
