Darlene Courtois, a Medicare patient, says she had never heard of kwashiorkor, a severe form of malnutrition. But federal records show her hospital billed Medicare for treating her for the condition.

"I never heard a doctor or nurse or any other medical personnel tell me I have kwashiorkor." The former patient's account is supported by Medicare and hospital records reviewed by California Watch ...

All told, the federal healthcare program paid more than $700 million in 2010 and 2011 for patients diagnosed with kwashiorkor—an amount so high that it has triggered a national review of claims ...

Redding, near Mount Shasta, and Victorville, in the Mojave Desert, have little in common but an unusual statistic: In each city, a hospital has reported alarming rates of a Third World nutritional ...

the hospital system upcoded patients for a severe form of malnutrition called kwashiorkor to receive higher payments from Medicare and Medicaid. Kernan's computer system recognized the words ...

In its statement, Prime said the drop in reports of kwashiorkor was the result of "certain changes in Medicare coding guidelines" for documenting malnutrition among elderly patients. As a result ...

Medicare pays hefty bonuses to hospitals for treating complicated medical cases, and a diagnosis of kwashiorkor can boost a hospital’s payout by more than $6,000 per patient, records show.

Kwashiorkor, also called edematous malnutrition, is a condition caused by malnutrition or famine in which an individual is extremely thin but has a swollen abdomen and swollen feet and ankles ...

The kwashiorkor patients were treated for infections, and patients with an Hb concentration of <5 g/100 mL received a blood transfusion and were excluded from the study. Patients received 150 mL ...

Kwashiorkor is a severe form of malnutrition. It can be found in very severe cases of starvation and is more common in developing countries. About 45% of deaths worldwide in children under the age ...