United Memorial Medical Center in Houston is voiding charges for several patients who visited a drive-thru COVID-19 test site it operated after an internal investigation revealed clinicians administered and charged the patients for additional tests they didn't consent to, according to the Houston Chronicle.
An internal audit revealed that a small number of patients received an additional respiratory pathogen panel of tests without written consent. One patient said she was billed $2,715 for the extra lab work.
A lawyer for the hospital said the patients who received the additional tests without consent will not be required to pay for the tests.
"It was brought to UMMC's attention that a handful of patients from the Kuykendahl Road testing site in Spring [Texas] were tested for the RPP panel without their prior written consent," the lawyer said, according to the report. "UMMC took those patient complaints very seriously. After conducting a thorough audit, UMMC contacted all of these patients, voided any insurance claims for services for which UMMC had no documented consent, and did not charge for the RPP tests."
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