BATON ROUGE — More than 1,000 deceased beneficiaries were removed from Medicaid after the program paid nearly $10 million to healthcare organizations over the last six years, a report from the Legislative Auditor's Office released Monday says.

In total, $9,603,074 in payments were sent to Managed Care Organizations by way of fixed per-member per-month fees for the administration of health benefits and payment of claims between February 2019 and March 2025.

"However, LDH is responsible for determining Medicaid beneficiary eligibility and enrolling applicants into and removing ineligible beneficiaries from Louisiana’s Medicaid program," the audit said.

The audit reviewed the progress the Louisiana Department of Health has made in identifying and removing Medicaid coverage for beneficiaries who are deceased. The review was made to "further the goals of the Governor’s Fiscal Responsibility Program, also known as LA DOGE."

LDH has used third-party data sources like obituaries, the Social Security Administration’s Death Master File and other states' Vital Records databases to identify 1,072 now-dead beneficiaries of Medicaid, the audit says.

A majority of these — 511 — were identified via obituaries, with the Social Security Administration’s Death Master File identifying 168, the audit says. The complete audit can be read here.

The audit also said that the number of Medicaid beneficiaries in Louisiana increased 12.8%, from 1,448,703 in July 2016 to 1,634,380 in March 2025.