Kindred Healthcare Fails to Escape Nursing Home Fraud Lawsuit

A whistleblower can advance a lawsuit alleging that Kindred Healthcare Inc. violated the False Claims Act by engaging in a scheme to improperly bill Medicare and Medicaid for nursing home services, a Pennsylvania federal district court said.

Kindred failed to show that whistleblower Timothy Sirls triggered the FCA’s public disclosure bar by basing his claims on a suit brought by another whistleblower in 2011, Judge Karen S. Marston of the US District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania said in a Tuesday opinion denying a motion to dismiss.

Sirls, a former director of nursing services at a Kindred facility, ...