Former WW neurosurgeon is named in federal suit
By Terry Murry on Monday, January 29th, 2024 in Columbia Basin News More Top Stories
SPOKANE – Eastern Washington U.S. Attorney Vanessa Waldref has announced that the United States and state of Washington has filed a complaint in federal district court against MultiCare Health System, a Tacoma-based hospital and healthcare system that owns and operates MultiCare Deaconess Hospital and MultiCare Rockwood Clinic in Spokane, alleging that MultiCare knowingly endangered patient safety and falsely and fraudulently billed Medicare, Medicaid, and other federal health care programs for spinal surgery procedures performed at Deaconess between 2019 and 2021 by Dr. Jason Dreyer, a former neurosurgeon.
Between 2013 and 2019, Dreyer practiced at Providence St. Mary’s Medical Center in Walla Walla, a hospital owned and operated by Providence Health and Services. In 2019, amidst allegations that he was performing medically-unnecessary surgeries, harming patients, and falsifying diagnoses, Providence permitted Dreyer to resign.
The complaint against MultiCare alleges that, following Dreyer’s resignation from Providence, MultiCare hired him to perform neurosurgery services at Deaconess. The complaint alleges that during MultiCare’s hiring process, it became aware of concerns and “red flags” about Dreyer and his surgical judgment from his time at Providence, but, recognizing that he was a “workhorse”, made the decision to hire him and allow him to begin seeing patients and performing surgery at Deaconess Hospital in July 2019. The complaint further alleges that in October 2019, MultiCare recognized that Dreyer was performing a high volume of surgeries and generating significant revenue for MultiCare, and so placed Dreyer on an incentive compensation structure, meaning that the greater volume and complexity of surgeries performed by Dreyer, the more money he would make.
The complaint also alleges that in February 2020, the United States Attorney’s Office specifically informed MultiCare that it was investigating concerns that Dreyer was harming patients, falsifying diagnoses, and performing medically-unnecessary surgeries. According to the complaint, despite receiving this information, as well as multiple internal complaints and concerns that Dreyer was performing medically unnecessary surgeries at MultiCare and endangering patients, MultiCare made the decision to allow Dreyer to continue seeing patients and performing surgery until the Washington Department of Health summarily suspended Dreyer’s ability to perform surgery in March 2021.
In April 2022, Providence agreed to pay approximately $22.7 million and implement a standard of care corporate integrity agreement to resolve its liability concerning surgical procedures performed by Dreyer and another neurosurgeon that Providence billed to federal health care programs. In April 2023, Dreyer agreed to pay approximately $1.2 million to resolve his individual liability under the False Claims Act.
