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hi, i'm tony munter at price benowitz and i want to talk a little bit about kickbacks. if i offer you a bribe to refer me a patient for my medical practice what is that? what if a dentist gets money from a company to use a certain kind of implant? it can be a kickback and it can be a serious violation of the law. there is something called the anti-kickback statute which applies to medicare and medicaid funds. the anti-kickback statute prohibits illegal remuneration. the illegal remuneration does not even have to be in the form of a cash. any bribe used to induce a doctor to use a product or even a referral given to a doctor in exchange for some kind of payment can be kickbacks. courts have held that as long as one purpose of the payment is to induce a doctor illegally that payment can be considered a kickback. any kickback involving medicare or medicaid funds also is subject to liability under the false claims act.

there is a reason for all this. we want the advice we get from our medical professionals to be all about and only about the medicine. we are supposed to act on the basis of informed consent to a procedure or treatment. but medicine is big business. a doctors decision about what drug to prescribe or what medical procedure to advocate can have large consequences in the marketplace. that is why congress acted to attempt to restrict any improper inducemetns which could interfere with the independent judgement of a medical professional.