Doctors Found to Own Many of Florida’s Labs

A study by the state of Florida has found that physicians own the vast majority of certain critical health-care facilities in the state, an arrangement that critics say provides a strong incentive for doctors to order unnecessary tests or questionable treatments to increase their incomes.

The study found, for example, that doctors own 93% of diagnostic-imaging centers and that several kinds of such facilities take in much more money per center than their non-doctor-owned counterparts.

The study, a preliminary version of which will be released today by the state’s Health Care Cost Containment Board, surveyed 2,669 health-care facilities in nine classifications and determined how many were “joint ventures” owned collectively by physicians and other medical groups.

Florida is thought to have an abnormally high incidence of joint ventures, but the practice is common throughout the country and has come under increasing scrutiny. Last month, for example, the Department of Health and Human Services issued new rules to discourage doctors from referring Medicare and Medicaid patients to joint-venture facilities.

The Florida cost containment board found that a high percentage of joint ventures “clearly indicated problems” in “access, costs, charges, utilization or quality” in three kinds of facilities: clinical laboratories (which perform blood tests and other diagnostic analyses); diagnostic imaging centers (which produce X-ray, CAT-scan and magnetic-resonance imaging), and physical therapy and rehabilitation centers.