Gurnee pain doctor charged with fraudulently billing Medicare

A doctor who ran a Gurnee pain clinic has been charged with fraudulently billing Medicare for nonexistent examinations and could face 10 years in prison, federal authorities said Friday.

Authorities said Eliza Diaconescu, 73, of Lake Forest, presigned blank prescriptions for hydrocodone, oxycodone and fentanyl for patients of her pain clinic so that the prescriptions could be provided to the patients even when Diaconescu was not at the clinic.

The patients would pick up the presigned prescriptions for the opioids from other workers at the clinic without being examined by Diaconescu, according to investigators with the U.S. attorney's office's Opioid Task Force.

Authorities said Diaconescu would then submit false claims seeking reimbursement from Medicare for the purported examinations, even though she did not meet face-to-face with the patients.

Attempts to reach Diaconescu were unsuccessful Friday afternoon.

An online listing for Diaconescu's Gurnee clinic says the business has been permanently closed. Additionally, the phone number listed for the clinic is out of service.

According to an online database on doctors maintained by U.S. News and World Report, Diaconescu is an anesthesiologist who has been practicing medicine for more than 21 years.

Charges against Diaconescu were announced Friday by officials representing the United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, the Chicago Division of the DEA, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the Chicago Division of the U.S. Department of Labor.

Diaconescu is due in court July 18.