Ask HRC: Tissue Fraud: How Should Healthcare Facilities Respond?

Healthcare Risk Control (HRC) has received several queries related to the recent case of Biomedical Tissue Services (BTS), which has been under investigation since October 2005 for alleged illegal harvesting of human tissue. A summary of the background information related to the investigation, ECRI's recommendations, and more resources are presented below.

BTS allegedly collaborated with several New York funeral homes and an embalming company to illicitly harvest human tissue from corpses and distribute it to processing companies. The tissue, which was subsequently processed for use in transplant procedures, was implanted in patients between early 2004 and September 2005. BTS and its accomplices allegedly violated federal regulations for donor screening and recovery of body...