There are many cases in which medical professionals and healthcare centers have to refer patients to other service providers. A doctor may make a diagnosis and note that a patient needs surgery, for example, but they are not a surgeon and will not carry out the procedure themselves. They need to refer that patient to a specialist.
A kickback is when the original healthcare provider is given some sort of incentive for those referrals. For instance, say that the owner and operator of a surgical center says that they will pay physicians $1,000 for every patient that they refer to that center. This would be an example of an illegal kickback.
Why would this be done?
The simple reason why is that the kickback seems like an easy way to get more patients, who can then be billed for procedures that may cost tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Medicare and Medicaid forbid such payments, These programs can be used to cover the cost of some of these medical services, and so the goal of the kickbacks is essentially to defraud the government by directing funds to that specific healthcare provider.
Your rights as a whistleblower
Kickbacks are not supposed to influence medical decisions, and they should certainly never open the door for fraud of government programs. If these things happen, whistleblowers need to understand all of the legal options that they have and the rights and protections that apply to their case. They can often report fraudulent activity without fear of retaliation.