Dallas Dermatopathology Lab Accused of Fraudulent Billing of Tricare

By Ron Shinkman, Editor, Laboratory Industry Report

A prominent dermatopathology laboratory in Dallas has been implicated in a CBS News investigation regarding potential fraudulent billing of the Tricare insurance program for military dependents.

According to the report, which was broadcast on June 8, Cockerell Dermatopathology set up makeshift collection sites at storefronts near the main gates of Ft. Hood in order to collect samples for molecular cancer and drug testing. The soldiers and their family members were given a $50 gift card to Walmart in exchange for providing samples ostensibly for a research project, the report alleged. Cockerell Dermatopathology would then bill the Tricare program thousands of dollars. One wife of a Ft. Hood solider underwent a battery of drug tests that led to 418 different charges to Tricare totaling more than $6,500, according to the report, which also alleged that an affiliate operating as Origen Laboratories grossed some $5 million in drug testing from Tricare last year.

At one site alleged to have been used as a clinic, CBS News uncovered Social Security numbers of soldiers who underwent their tests, copies of their identification, and blood and DNA samples left in a pile in a shed.

Clay J. Cockerell, M.D., the president of Cockerell Dermatopathology, was taped ducking a reporter’s questions at the parking lot of the lab, then getting back into his car and driving away. In another segment taped in West Hollywood, Calif., CBS recorded a salesman allegedly working on Cockerell Dermatopathology’s behalf boasting of billing Tricare as much as $16,000 for a molecular cancer test and engaging in high-pressure tactics to get medical practices to use its assays.

Responding to the CBS News report, Cockerell Dermatopathology explained that its core services are anatomic pathology and dermatopathology but it has relationships with others, such as Origen Laboratories—owned by Clay Cockerell, M.D.—which perform genomics and toxicology testing. “When Origen became aware that certain individuals were operating outside of the organization’s strict compliance requirements regarding the manner in which laboratory services are marketed, we took immediate action, including terminating individuals and relationships with those that acted in violation of the laboratory’s compliance policies,” Cockerell Dermatopathology said in a statement on its website. “We are also voluntarily refunding monies resulting from these activities. In no case did Origen or Cockerell profit from these activities as suggested by the CBS story.”