Replacing defective heart devices costs Medicare $1.5B over 10 years
Medicare paid at least $1.5 billion over a decade to replace seven types of faulty heart devices, according to a HHS Office of Inspector General report released Oct. 2.
The report didn’t identify specific manufacturers, but the devices include implanted cardio defibrillators and a pacemaker, according to Kaiser Health News. Nearly 73,000 people had one of the devices replaced because of recalls, premature failures, medically necessary upgrades or infections.
Patients paid $140 million in related out-of-pocket costs from 2005 through 2014, according to the report.
In the KHN article, experts suggested stricter reporting requirements for malfunctioning devices could lead to earlier recalls, which would cut Medicare spending and reduce the health risks and out-of-pocket costs incurred by patients with defective devices.
“Medicare is spending a lot of money on something that doesn’t seem to be their problem,” Rita Redberg, a University of California, San Francisco professor and cardiologist who advises Medicare, told KHN. “Most places, if something is defective, the manufacturer is responsible for replacing it, not the store where you bought it.”
However, medical device companies and some doctors have opposed tighter reporting standards, saying they would be difficult and expensive to implement.
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Daniel joined TriMed’s Chicago editorial team in 2017 as a Cardiovascular Business writer. He previously worked as a writer for daily newspapers in North Dakota and Indiana.