The Senior Medicare Patrols (SMP) are a group of volunteer organizations funded by the
United States Department of Health and Human Services
The United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is a cabinet-level executive branch department of the U.S. federal government created to protect the health of all Americans and providing essential human services. Its motto is ...
, which educate U.S.
senior citizens
Old age refers to ages nearing or surpassing the life expectancy of human beings, and is thus the end of the human biological life cycle, life cycle. Terms and euphemisms for people at this age include old people, the elderly (worldwide usage ...
on how to prevent, detect, and report
Medicare and
Medicaid
Medicaid in the United States is a federal and state program that helps with healthcare costs for some people with limited income and resources. Medicaid also offers benefits not normally covered by Medicare, including nursing home care and pers ...
fraud
In law, fraud is intentional deception to secure unfair or unlawful gain, or to deprive a victim of a legal right. Fraud can violate civil law (e.g., a fraud victim may sue the fraud perpetrator to avoid the fraud or recover monetary compens ...
, error, and abuse. From the program's start in 1997 through December 2019, SMP projects and staff have recovered about $129 million in Medicare and Medicaid funds, and between 2016 through 2019, the program led 107,000 group education sessions and reached an estimated 6.5 million people through community education events. SMP has trained over 30,000 volunteers and received more than 300,000 complaints for investigation. Further, but untrackable, reductions in fraud and error likely occur because of beneficiaries' increased scrutiny of their bills.
In August 2020, the
Administration for Community Living
The Administration for Community Living (ACL) is part of the United States Department of Health and Human Services. It is headed by the Administrator and Assistant Secretary for Aging, who reports directly to the Secretary of Health and Human ...
awarded funding to the Northeast Iowa Area Agency on Aging to act as the Senior Medicare Patrol National Resource Center (SMPNRC). Planned initiatives include maintenance of the public facing website and a mobile application.
See also
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Medicare fraud In the United States, Medicare fraud is the claiming of Medicare health care reimbursement to which the claimant is not entitled. There are many different types of Medicare fraud, all of which have the same goal: to collect money from the Medicare ...
References
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Senior Medicare Patrols
Health fraud
Medicare fraud