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State settles dispute with care provider
Durham company ends lawsuit, will repay $1.6 million
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Published: November 7, 2008
RALEIGH
North Carolina has settled litigation with a mental-health-services provider over disputed Medicaid payments.
The N.C. Department of Health and Human Services said this week that Dominion Healthcare in Durham has agreed to reimburse the state agency more than $1.6 million.
The agreement stems from a state investigation that began in February 2007. It requires that the state manually review Dominion's claims for compliance with Medicaid requirements.
The state's mental-health division has led at least three investigations of Dominion since 2006. After a series of financial reviews, the state department determined that Dominion had improperly provided services or improperly billed Medicaid.
The Raleigh News & Observer reported that when the program began in 2006, the state offered companies up to $61 an hour to help mentally ill people learn tasks. But the state discovered that the program was being billed for taking people to movies and helping children with homework.
The newspaper reported that Dominion charged taxpayers $33.9 million, the second highest of all contracting agencies.
Regulators tried to close Dominion and its statewide network of offices, but the company sued the state for more than $1 billion.
Dominion's chief executive, Joel Hopkins, said Wednesday that he wanted his company to "just move on and move forward" from the settlement.
He said he was more concerned about Dominion employees and Dominion consumers who may now receive delayed services.
Still, Hopkins said he was at peace with the decision. "No company is going to be perfect," he said. "You're going to have human error. I can deal with that."
Hopkins said that the state was too focused on the administrative aspect of the situation and not enough on the overall problems facing North Carolina's mental-health-care system.
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