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Carbondale physician sentenced on federal health care fraud charges

Dennis C. Pfannenschmidt, United States Attorney for the  Middle District of Pennsylvania, announced that a Scranton area physician was sentenced Monday by United States District Court Judge A. Richard Caputo on federal health care fraud charges.

Judge Caputo sentenced Salko to a two-year term of  probation, 100 hours of community service, and ordered Dr. Gregory J.
Salko to pay a $20,000 fine.

According to Pfannenschmidt, Salko, 63, of Carbondale, owner-operator of the Whites Crossing Medical Group in Carbondale, was originally indicted in July 2007 with two counts of health care fraud and 17 counts of false statements in health care matters. The charges related to Salko’s treatment and falsification of medical records pertaining to two elderly Medicare patients in 2005 and 2006.

On June 30, Salko pleaded guilty to a two-count,  misdemeanor of superceding information. One count alleged that Salko made false representations of material facts in a July 17, 2005, progress note he prepared for one of his elderly Medicare patients. The indictment alleged the progress notes were fictitious because the patient had replaced Salko with another physician in May 2005. Shortly after the patient switched physicians, she was diagnosed with breast cancer and underwent a mastectomy.

In the second count, Salko allegedly committed a criminal violation of the HIPAA Privacy Act by falsely representing in writing to the Community Medical Center in Scranton on April 3, 2007, that he was authorized to obtain the medical records of the other elderly Medicare patient, Peggy Rogers. Rogers, 69, was a resident of Birch Hill assisted living facility in Carbondale owned by Salko.

On Aug. 20, 2006, Rogers was admitted to the Carbondale Hospital emergency room wearing soiled clothing and smelling of urine and had dead skin on her legs and feet. Rogers also appeared with fluid draining from an open, four-centimeter-wide lesion on her right breast.

Subsequent testing confirmed Rogers had advanced breast cancer. She died less than three months later.

Salko was removed as Rogers’ physician after the Lackawanna County Court of Common Pleas appointed an official from the Pennsylvania Area Agency on Aging as Roger’s court appointed guardian.

The case was handled by investigators from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the Inspector General’s Office and prosecuted by Kim Douglas Daniel, assistant U.S attorney.