HHS Office of Inspector General Publishes Information on Audits of Telehealth Claims

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office of the Inspector General (OIG) has published findings on audits of Medicare telehealth services claims as well as guidance and tools for practices.

In 2022 and 2023, OIG has conducted extensive audits on telehealth services. The OIG found that the use of telehealth increased dramatically during the first year of the pandemic. More than 28 million Medicare beneficiaries—about 2 in 5—used telehealth services that first year. In total, beneficiaries used 88 times more telehealth services during the first year of the pandemic than they did in the prior year, as reported in the September 2022 OIG Report.

In response to requests from stakeholders, the OIG is now providing a Telehealth Toolkit as an additional resource to support the oversight of telehealth. The goal of the OIG toolkit is to provide an approach to analyze claims data for telehealth to identify areas in which additional safeguards may be necessary. The analysis can also help identify providers whose billing may pose a risk and warrant further scrutiny.

To access the OIG Telehealth Toolkit, see here: Download the OIG Toolkit.