Feds announce massive takedown of fraudulent nursing diploma scheme

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: ABC News

A massive, coordinated scheme to sell false and fraudulent nursing degree credentials has been brought down by a joint federal law enforcement operation, Justice Department officials announced Wednesday.

Officials said the scheme involved peddling bogus, forged diplomas and transcripts from what had been accredited schools to aspiring nurses, in order to help candidates bypass the qualifying requirements necessary to sit for the national nursing board exam. Although they still had to take the exam, the bogus credentials allowed them to skip vital steps of the competency and licensure process, officials said -- and once licensed, those individuals were able to find a job in the health care field.

Overall, the conspiracy involved the distribution of over 7,600 fake nursing diplomas and certificates issued by Florida-based nursing programs, according to officials. "This is probably one of the most brazen schemes that I've seen. And it does shock the mind," Omar Perez Aybar, Special Agent in Charge, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services - Office of Inspector General (HHS-OIG), told ABC News in an exclusive interview.

The sweeping enforcement action spanned five states: Florida, New York, New Jersey, Texas and Delaware, and resulted in more than two dozen criminal wire fraud and wire fraud conspiracy charges against 25 individuals. HHS-OIG, the FBI and Justice Department worked jointly on the operation, dubbed "Operation Nightingale," in honor of Florence Nightingale, the founder of modern nursing.

Read more: https://abcnews.go.com/US/feds-announce-massive-takedown-fraudulent-nursing-diploma-scheme/story?id=96619487

[Wingus Dingus]

1. 7600 fake nurses. That's scary AF.

[chowder66]

2. +1

[paleotn]

21. NO! One still has to pass the NCLEX to become licensed.

Only a small % actually passed their boards and become license. That small number are now liable to lose their licenses since graduating from an accredited nursing program is a requirement BEFORE taking your boards.

[Pas-de-Calais]

3. FFS!

[MichMan]

4. Anyone participating needs to be fired and prohibited from working in the medical field ever again

on top of any criminal charges

[NullTuples]

5. Dollars to donuts I'd bet the majority attended offshore schools.

Since they still had to pass the testing, they had to have acquired enough knowledge to do so. But why the false transcripts unless their school wasn't accredited, or worse barely legitimate. They could also have attended US-accredited schools but barely passed. Or didn't but were still confident they could pass the testing required.

For instance - and I have no doubt this is typical right now given worker shortages - a major HMO here in California has as of late hired a surprising number of professionals who attended medical school in Barbados, or the Bahamas. Most seem at least baseline competent so far, but what if someone competent but dishonest wanted to get hired by a hospital/health care company with higher standards?

[getagrip_already]

7. Op said they forged transcripts.....

peddling bogus, forged diplomas and transcripts from what had been accredited schools to aspiring nurses, in order to help candidates bypass the qualifying requirements

I guess they could have been prepped on the exact questions used on the exams. There are professional test takers who will sit through an exam multiple times, recording every question.

You can find the questions on the internet for a small fee.

These people KNOW they have fraudulent credentials. This isn't a case of "I didn't know"...

[NullTuples]

8. Then they also know they have the potential to harm patients due to ignorance.

They are not victims and should have the proverbial book thrown at them too, not just the people selling the credentials.

[getagrip_already]

10. State licenses come with a lot of legal constraints...

I strongly suspect each applicant had to sign an affidavit that the information they are providing is truthful... under penalty of perjury.

The people who used these services are truly screwed.

[NullTuples]

12. *If* they are individually investigated & prosecuted. That's up to each state.

I could see some states not wanting to bother, or admit they let a large number slip through. Or they have a relative who took advantage of the scam, or...

[getagrip_already]

15. If they fail to act....

And someone is injured or dies, I wonder if the state could be sued?

At the very least, they need to revoke any licenses issued.

They really do have to act on this since it's a public safety issue and a governor could look really bad.....

[NullTuples]

17. but...have you SEEN some of the choices GOP state govs make? People DO get hurt.

[NNadir]

6. I had no idea Trump University offered nursing degrees. Nt

[markodochartaigh]

11. Trump University

I hear that one of their top professors is George Anthony Devolder Santos RN, CCRN, MSN, PhD., LLC, MRE, LLPOFHFATW, BS.

I've been an RN since 1983. Many of the best nurses that I worked with were the diploma school nurses. A solid academic foundation is necessary to be a good nurse but good training once you hit the floor is just as important. Back in the 80's we were making less than $10/hr and had to work unpaid overtime as well. So many of these wonderful nurses worked so hard for so little.

[NullTuples]

13. Can a barely educated nurse become a good one through experience only?

And if so, is there the potential for harming patients in while they gain that experience?

Thank you for your perspective and relating your knowledge! I recently had emergency surgery and it was the nurses who made me feel confident in the hospital's care, and thus that I was going to be okay.

[markodochartaigh]

24. I think that some academic component is absolutely necessary.

At least a good junior high school level of math is necessary and at least a sophomore college level of anatomy and physiology. Beyond that probably most people who really wanted to become a nurse could be trained on the floor, although if one has only the basic education it would take several years. Really the desire to help others through nursing and a program which sincerely has as its main function training a nurse to the highest standards are the prerequisites to turning out the best nurses. From what I saw the diploma schools excelled in these areas. I didn't go to a diploma school but in my class out of 28 students only 7 graduated. If the instructors felt that academically you couldn't make the grade, or if they felt that even once you were not committed to the patient's best interests they would drop the student in a day. It seemed cruel at the time, but it was in the students' best interests to find another field and in the school's best interest to maintain a 100% pass rate on boards.
But if a person studying to become a nurse, whether in the hospital or in school, harms a patient, it is the hospital's and the school's fault for putting someone in a position for which they weren't qualified. Obviously the incentive for putting unqualified people in dangerous situations is financial. And in the corporate medical industrial complex this is a real concern.

[NullTuples]

28. Thank you!

[littlemissmartypants]

9. Wow!

Well done, HHS-OIG, the FBI and theJustice Department!

[live love laugh]

14. Florida! Again ... 😏

[ShazzieB]

16. But not JUST Florida! 😉

My first thought was, "Oh, Floriduh is at it again, eh?" But this is multiple states, including some blue ones!

[Alexander Of Assyria]

29. America is the goto nation for con artists. A sizeable minority conditioned for gullibility by

joined at the hip media corporations agendas.

For example, gullible enough to believe a 840 billion dollar a year military budget deserves mere hours of congressional debate, a small dot on the media map, the moment passes…email server investigations, rankling over immigration and pensions and everything else…countless hours.

America runs on mass gullibility.

[orangecrush]

19. Yep

Amazing

[PSPS]

18. Seattle University has been offering bogus MSU degrees too

Seattle University is being sued by four nursing students for allegedly offering a Master of Science in Nursing (MSN) degree they were not accredited to offer.

Three of the four students involved in the lawsuit are former students, and one of the students is currently a student enrolled in the Advanced Practice Nursing Immersion (APNI) to Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) program at Seattle University College of Nursing.

The APNI to DNP program is for non-nurses who would like to earn a DNP. The program takes four calendar years to complete. Upon successful completion, the student will earn a DNP.

More at: https://nurse.org/articles/nursing-students-sue-seattle-university-msn/

[3catwoman3]

23. It is my long held belief that my profession has way too many...

...roads to Rome, so to speak. It just doesn't feel right to me to grant someone an advanced degree in a field in which they do not hold the entry level degree. There is a program for nurses with bachelor's degrees to become master's degree nurse practitioners that is done entirely on line - even teaching physical examination skills. How you can teach someone to palpate an abdomen or look in an ear or feel for breast lumps solely on line, without hands on experience, is incomprehensible to me.

Associate degree grads and baccalaureate grads take the exact same licensing exam and all those who pass get the title
RN - Registered Nurse. Is there any other field of endeavor where someone with an associate's degree takes the same licensing exam as someone with a bachelor's degree and gets awarded the same title?

(I am coming up on 2 years of retirement from almost 48 years in nursing, 45 of which were spent as a pediatric nurse practitioner.)

[DENVERPOPS]

20. I was post op

and the medical insurance corporation insisted I go to one of these facilities that was long term care/ rehab etc.
I still required real nursing care. Injections, flushing of catheters, important meds etc.

The first day, a young girl, maybe early 20's came in to flush my IV cath. Her name tag had her name, and in large print RN.

I asked her which school she graduated from because I have many friends who are RN's and went to CU or Loretto Heights, etc.

I was not prepared for her to start crying. I asked her why she was crying, she told me the following:

She said that the "RN" one the name tags is used by THIS CORPORATION, as an "employee designation", not to indicate the person has an RN.........
She said she borrowed 40K to go to a "private, well known school that had a part time curriculum for their "nursing" school.... She soon found out it was a total farce and she has realized that there is no way she would be prepared in the slightest to be an RN, much less pass the Nursing Boards/Tests.
I asked her if her schooling was including things like Anatomy, Physiology, Pharmacology, etc.........she said NO, her assignment for the class last week was to write a 10 page paper on "The Joy of Nursing"......
She also didn't have even a medical assistant certification, and was being paid less than ten dollars an hour.

After the first night there, which turned into a House of Horrors, I told my wife what happened to me last night, and told her to either take me home, or I would crawl out the facilities back door and out into traffic...........Thankfully I didn't need any more cath flushing or injections or IV's, so she took me home...........

When the nurse told me the story about this paper mill school and the name of it, I laughed. I told her that when I was a corporate executive and needed some one, I would tell personnel of my need and to prescreen the applications. They needed to find me an MBA was one of the requirements. I also told Personnel to throw out anyone whose application purportedly had a MBA from the same school that had fleeced her.

Somehow all these mainstream internet schools were able to give them all financial aid for their schooling. Then somehow the Schools were able to have the government take over the loans and pay the schools the money. When students got wise to what was going on, they simply went bankrupt. U.S. Congress figured out that not only had the students been duped, but so had the government. To cover the Govt/s asses, the suddenly declared that students could not go bankrupt on the loans to the federal government.....

I believe, for that reason alone, all school loans of that nature, should be cancelled with the government picking up the tab.....
In a regular school/college/University, the student got a real degree and education. These ones, who were fleeced got NOTHING...

[live love laugh]

25. Very informative post. I wasn't aware of a lot of this.

I’m definitely going to be more vigilant when it comes to the credentials of medical people going forward.

[3catwoman3]

26. This is one of the most horrifying things I have...

...ever read. I can only imagine your shock when that young woman started crying.

[riversedge]

22. Goodnes! I am sure glad they are onto this fraud! Dangerous if they got away with it.

[Kali]

27. oh my

I remember one of my "personal" drunken teenage trolls was claiming to be a nursing student in Florida. wonder if any connection?

[nitpicked]

30. Link to the DoJ PR

https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdfl/pr/fraudulent-nursing-diploma-scheme-leads-federal-charges-against-25-defendants