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Case Studies

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Unearthing $45M overpaid claims at top US health payer

Unearthing $45M overpaid claims at top US health payer

Unearthing $45M overpaid claims at top US health payer

How advanced analytics flagged fraud, waste and abuse to boost cost recoveries

How advanced analytics flagged fraud, waste and abuse to boost cost recoveries

$45M

Overpayments recovered

20x

More claims flagged

60%

Detection accuracy

25%

Flagged claims are systemic issues

The challenge

Rooting out overpayments and containing costs

A leading US health payer wanted to curb Medicare and Medicaid overpayments. The healthcare system loses over $200B to fraud, waste, and abuse (FWA) annually. Comparing similar claims is essential for identifying irregular claims or aberrant billing practices, but made more difficult by disconnected data and complex member-provider patterns.

Key challenges

  • Healthcare system vulnerable to fraudulent and wasteful claims

  • Inconsistent detection of coverage eligibility

  • Pressing need for scalable cost containment

  • Limited capacity to compare similar claims

The solution

Leveraging unsupervised learning for overpayment detection

Identified systemic overpayments

Flagged bogus billing patterns

More successful detections

Improved claim accuracy

Automated validation

Prioritized low-complexity claims

Amplified detection accuracy

Minimized manual reviews

Implementation approach

1

Focus areas

  • Define FWA drivers

  • Develop hypotheses

  • Identify impact

2

Segmentation

  • Automate framework processes

  • Conduct clinical validations

  • Cost containment protocols

3

Scalability

  • Automate framework processes

  • Conduct clinical validations

  • Cost containment protocols

Implementation approach

1

Step 1

Data collection and integration framework

Data collection and integration framework

Define FWA drivers and high-impact areas

2

Step 2

Advanced analysis framework

Advanced analysis framework

Map 50+ hypotheses for internal and external data

Content

Content

3

Step 3

Response strategy implementation

Response strategy implementation

Create homogenous segments with unsupervised methods

Content

Content

4

Step 4

Content

Content

Evaluate anomalies in dosage, pricing, or coverage to flag overpayments

Content

Content

The impact

Transformed claims recovery through intelligent insights

Financial gains

$45M

Overpayments uncovered

  • 75% dosage/unit errors

  • 25% systemic issues

  • Reduced fraud

Process efficiency

60%

Detection accuracy

  • Vs. 10–20% baseline

  • Targeted leads for foragers

  • Reduced manual rechecks

Strategic results

20x

More claims flagged

  • Prioritized by impact

  • Fewer overlooked aberrancies

  • Boost in payer confidence

Looking ahead

Real-time alerts

  • Instant fraud detection to halt overpayments at submission

Fraud risk index

  • Developing a global scoring system for claims risk

Ethical AI protocols

  • Developing transparent, bias-free fraud detection