Medicaid

Rick Perry: Mum's The Word

Rick Perry has adopted a more behind-the-scenes approach this time around. That doesn't mean he hasn't been busy.

Thieves' Bazaar: Medicare Fraud

Hospitals, doctors and dealers have made Medicare the nation's sweetest crime. The feds are now trying to shutter the door.

Beer Nuts: State Alcoholic Beverage Laws Front and Center with Lege This Week

No doubt some of you may want to know the many ways the Texas legislature is going to improve your opportunities this session to drink alcoholic spirits. Toss the kids and forget Medicaid, there's always one or two more ways to tinker with the state's alcoholic beverage code each session. No doubt, ... More >>

Texas Starts The Debate Whether To Take Obamacare's Medicaid Money

Advocates of Medicaid expansion -- part of Obama's Affordable Care Act -- continue to ply Texas lawmakers with economic numbers, making the point that the expansion of the program is not a cost, but a benefit, to taxpayers. Like Sisyphus eternally pushing his boulder up the hill, advocates for Medi ... More >>

Exposer of Fraudulent Texas Drug Protocol Named Whistleblower of the Year

The man who exposed a drug maker's fraudulent marketing of an antipsychotic drug that is still given to Texas's foster care children has won the Taxpayers Against Fraud Education Fund's Whistleblower of the Year Award. Allen Jones was forced out of his job at the Pennsylvania Office of Inspector G ... More >>

Jack L. Baker: Radiologist To Pay $650,000 To Settle Kickback Case

A man described by prosecutors as "a prominent Houston radiologist" has agreed to pay $650,000 to settle claims that he provided kickbacks to get physicians to refer business his way. Jack L. Baker of the Fairmount Diagnostic Center in Pasadena entered into the agreement today, settling claims file ... More >>

Comment of the Day: Rick Perry Battles Creeping Socialism

We have some great commenters here on Hair Balls, and it's time we paid some damn attention to them. So we'll be highlighting a Comment of the Day each morning or afternoon from the previous day's work. Maybe two comments, even. This will all be determined by a highly rigorous scientific formula i ... More >>

Rick Perry Stands Tall Against Socialism, Obamacare and Godless Federal Dollars

Governor Rick Perry has confirmed in a letter today to U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius that he's no pal of socialism and as such, must reject two key measures of Obamacare - a state insurance exchange and expanding Medicaid. To embrace a state exchange would mean playing ... More >>

State Settles With Johnson & Johnson Over Risperdal: $158 Million

A drug company accused of fraudulently promoting the antipsychotic Risperdal for use in Texas's Medicaid system has settled a state Attorney General's lawsuit for $158 million. The AG's office, one of several across the country to sue Janssen Pharmaceuticals (a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson) for ... More >>

Down the Hatch

The Texas Attorney General's Office says a drugmaker lied in order to push an antipsychotic on foster children. So why are kids as young as three still taking the drug?

Cover Story: Foster Kids on Antipsychotics

​Here's a riddle: If the Texas Attorney General sues a drug manufacturer for allegedly lying about the safety and efficacy of one of its antipsychotics, why would the state agency that oversees the foster care system still allow that drug to be given to kids as young as three? Why would the s ... More >>

Debt Ceiling: The 10 Worst Tweets From the Texas GOP Congressional Delegation

Tweets don't fail me now​As the GOP debates whether it wants the Tea Party to drive it (and the country) off a cliff by playing games with the debt ceiling, we looked to Twitter for the updates from our state's congresssional delegation. Oddly, the Republicans didn't tweet anything like "Yes, ... More >>

Christina Clardy: West U Doctor, Two Others Convicted in $30 Million Medicaid Fraud

Christina Clardy among those convicted.​Christina Clardy, a 61-year-old West U doctor, was convicted with two other people of running a massive Medicaid-and-money-laundering scam that somehow involved Nigerian tankers, the U.S. Attorney's Office announced today. Kenneth Anokam, 56, and Niger ... More >>

Planned Parenthood: Punched in the Uterus by Misguided Texas Senate

More bad news for women who rely on Planned Parenthood.​A Texas Senate subcommittee wrangled the vulvas of Texas women into a chokehold yesterday with its latest assault on Planned Parenthood. Republican Senator Robert Deuell, who is a physician, introduced a bill to a three-member subcommitte ... More >>

Bassey & Rose Essien: Father-Daughter Team With Million-Dollar Adult-Diaper Scam

In this family, missy, we scam the government with adult diapers!!!​Keeping things in the family, passing knowledge from one generation to the next: It's a heartwarming American tradition, especially when it involves ripping off Medicaid for more than a million dollars with an adult-diaper sca ... More >>

Richard Johnson: Parents Sue Over Texas' Handling of His Health Care

Lawsuit over the state's medical care programs​Parents of a mentally handicapped man with cerebral palsy are suing Texas for cutting him from state-funded health care because he has turned 21. Richard Johnson requires 24-hour care and taking away his state-funded nursing care would create "an ... More >>

FAIR-y Tales: Mexican Macro-economics

FAIR-y Tales: Whose Dole Is It, Anyway?

Former MHMRA Psychologist Leddy Convicted of Fraud

Courtesy of Montgomery County Sheriff's Office​A former psychologist with the Mental Health and Mental Retardation Authority of Harris County, who evaluated defendants in close to 1,000 criminal cases during his time with the agency, recently pled guilty to Medicaid fraud. Matthew Leddy, the ... More >>

The Burmese Come to Houston

Get in, get out. Refugees have a shrinking window of support until it's time to fend for themselves.

Psychologist's Fraud Arrest May Affect Trials He Testified In

Photo courtesy Montgomery County Sheriff's OfficeMatthew Leddy, a local psychologist, was arrested late last month for theft and Medicaid fraud, accused of billing for work that he didn't perform, according to articles in the Houston Chronicle and the Conroe Courier. The articles don't mention, howe ... More >>

Refugees In Houston Struggle With The Health-Care System Even More Than The Rest Of Us

A Bhutanese refugee has been holed up in his southwest Houston apartment for months, downing pain killers. This isn't the new life he had in mind. Rubber sandals cover the mat outside the spare, dim apartment. The man is embedded in an easy chair. He periodically winces and grabs his stomach. ... More >>

The Recruit

Places all over Houston want Trevor Falk and pitch the wonders of community life. He is 24 and has Down syndrome, which makes him a hot commodity for private group homes.

Guilty Of Medicaid Fraud? Depends

If you're going to try to defraud the government, please -- for your own self-esteem -- choose a more glamorous plan than one involving adult diapers.When the announcement came in from the US Attorney's Office headlined that a local company owner had been "INDICTED IN ADULT DIAPER FRAUD CASE," we co ... More >>

Local Attorneys Help Hit Drugmaker Hard

$800 million is a ton of money to settle a civil suit, but two Houston attorneys helped win a settlement of that size this morning.Joel Androphy, who specializes in whistleblower suits, worked with Sarah Frazier and won a big one as the drug giant Eli Lilly agreed to pay that whopping amount to sett ... More >>

Hispanics Delivered by Border Midwives Are Having Trouble Getting U.S. Passports: Location, Location

Midwives further north say business is much better than for their counterparts to the south

Foster Kids In Texas Get Lots of Meds

What Happens When Chronically Ill Kids Grow Up

Physically disabled young adults who weren't supposed to live this long find themselves hemmed in by an unprepared heath care system

Mail Call

Unhappy Customer

Parish Predators

Despite the bishop’s remarks to the contrary, the Galveston-Houston Roman Catholic Archdiocese had child molesters and let them go. But don’t blame just the Church.

Money for Nothing

Hopeful beggars shake their virtual cups online

Against All Odds

A group of unsupervised mental patients running from Katrina made it from New Orleans to Houston. Victor Fruge led the way.

Letters

Bar X Views

Plus: Junk Food, Junk Suits; Pigeon Hold, Meds for the Poor

Falun Follow-up

Plus: Porn Priorities?, House Woes, Sit on It

Med Check

Texas can't decide whether to pay for drug-resistance tests that could prolong the lives of those with HIV. For John Termine, it's already too late.

Common Cents

Area housing for the mentally ill remains deplorable, but a state subsidy might improve conditions

Con's Con

A contained experiment in Medicaid finally gets uncovered

Letters, Week of November 22

Fed Up with Feds, Still Reeling, Diabolical Docs

Paying the Price

Hospital district officials wanted a simple one-sentence policy on immigrant health care. What they got instead was a criminal probe and plenty of politics.

Rx for Failure?

MHMRA restricts Medicaid services at mental health clinic pharmacies

Catch Us If You Can

Steve Chesser went to MHMRA for help. Sent home from its emergency clinic without medicine or therapy, he shot his and killed himself. Diagnosis: A mental health care system in free fall.

Letters 09-14-2000

Blowing Smoke, Pay to Play, Ill Will

Warded Off

She got into a suspect nursing home. And the probate system got most of her money.

Drowning on Dry Land

Rising asthma rates have experts scratching their heads - and children struggling to breathe

Downing

Texas Lottery. Let's buy our tickets and bet on the day that Robert Arthur Pearson finally kills himself in public while we all watch

Strangers in Paradise

Kosovar refugees in Houston fight to hang on in a land they don't understand

Dangerous Deficits

Mental health cuts may come back to haunt the public

Holistic Touch

Some ex-patients credit the mind-body therapy of New Age healer JoAnne Mandel with saving their lives. Others say her compassion stopped at the bottom line.

Old and In The Way

How slow turnings of tiny bureaucratic gears grind up real Texans