Lawsuit accuses ProScan of misdiagnosing patient MRI scans
A recently unsealed whistleblower lawsuit accuses MRI-reading company ProScan of using physician assistants, instead of radiologists, to read “hundreds” of MRI scans daily, incorrectly diagnosing patients, according to reporting done by WCPO Cincinnati.
Former ProScan radiology assistant Jason Taylor and Peter Rothschild, MD, filed the False Claims Act lawsuit in October 2017 after Rothschild, a California-based radiologist, reviewed multiple ProScan reports and received numerous calls from doctors expressing “grave concerns,” WCPO reported.
According to the lawsuit, Cincinnati-based ProScan submitted thousands of fraudulent Medicare, Medicaid and Tricare reimbursements claims for MRIs not read by qualified doctors. The report alleges this cost the government “hundreds of millions.”
“This lack of proper review has caused injury to patients whose images were mistakenly read as normal by the unlicensed readers and not properly reviewed by a qualified physician. Likewise, ProScan frequently misdiagnoses as serious – and even life-threatening – imaging findings that are of no consequence,” according to the lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Cincinnati.
ProScan refuted these claims, insisting all of its radiology reports are “reviewed and finalized by licensed-certified physicians.”
ProScan runs 25 freestanding imaging centers in seven states. It’s teleradiology branch, ProScan Reading, interprets 2,000 MRIs each day for 500 hospitals and imaging centers around the world, according to the lawsuit.
“If these millions of MRIs were re-read by board-certified radiologists, the true scale of this tragedy would become clear,” the lawsuit read.
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Matt joined Chicago’s TriMed team in 2018 covering all areas of health imaging after two years reporting on the hospital field. He holds a bachelor’s in English from UIC, and enjoys a good cup of coffee and an interesting documentary.