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Telehealth was used 13x more in the first year of the pandemic than it was
in the previous year.
A virtual option has been essential for many throughout COVID, allowing people to see a doctor without the in-person risk.
In the year before the pandemic, 3 million people used telehealth services in 6 federal programs that we looked at. In the first year
of the pandemic, that number skyrocketed to 37 million people.
In our latest report, IGs across these programs answer the question:
How did these telehealth programs perform during the pandemic?
Here's what our report covers
Risks found in telehealth fraud
- billing for the same telehealth service twice
- inappropriately billing the most expensive level of services
- billing for services that were seemingly not appropriate for telehealth
Call for additional safeguards
- monitoring of telehealth services
- billing controls to prevent inappropriate payments for telehealth services
- collecting additional data
Our report explains how telehealth helped individuals access health care in a crisis. It also flags the importance of safeguarding telehealth services against fraud, waste, and abuse.
We've learned that even though a lot went right, we need targeted, collaborative oversight and better data.
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Watch: IGs explain their telehealth findings and answer the question: how was telehealth impacted
by the pandemic?
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