Kickback

It was shocking news to Dr. William .H. Leake, president of the Los Angeles County Medical Association--shocking and incredible. At first he refused to believe that 70% of the country's physicians were taking rebates from laboratories, opticians, drugstores, medical supply firms. One day last week Dr. Leake stormed into the Los Angeles Better Business Bureau and snorted that the bureau's charges were unfair, that the rebate-takers were only "a small if undesirable minority."

For an hour Dr. Leake listened to evidence presented by the bureau's Robert Bauer. Bauer showed him laboratory records with the names of physicians, explained some of the tricks of the trade. Firms, sometimes appointed by doctors as "agents," had charged the patient double and remitted the 100% overcharge to the patient's physician. Doctors had joined "cooperative" laboratories and received dividends based on the amount of business they sent.

After examining the evidence, Dr. Leake signed a joint statement with the Better Business Bureau's Bauer. Yes, a "substantial number" of doctors was involved.

In future, the medical society's council stands ready to expel any member found guilty of accepting rebates from any source. The A.M.A.'s Journal promised that an editorial denouncing kickbacks to doctors would appear in next week's issue. A warning also came from Los Angeles' Collector of Internal Revenue Harry C. Westover; he said that he would see whether doctors had reported their rebates to the tax collector.

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