Newspaper Report Ties Distributor Owner to High Volume of Fusions

By Greg Jones, Western Bureau ChiefA front-page story in the Wall Street Journal on Thursday shone a spotlight on a long-criticized provision of California's Official Medical Fee Schedule that allows middlemen to charge inflated prices for devices used in spinal surgeries on injured workers. The Journal reported that a consultant who owned a medical device distributorship was inflating the price of implantable devices used for back surgeries and recruiting surgeons to perform fusions. The newspaper said Paul Richard Randall was paid $3.2 million between 2008 and 2011 to work as a business ...