The federal government is investigating Northwestern Memorial Hospital and two other Chicago-area facilities, charging that the hospitals for listing patients in need liver transplants as more sick than they actually are in order to obtain organ donations.

According to documents filed by the U.S. attorney’s office, the Chicago Sun-Times reported Monday, investigators are looking into whether false claims from Northwestern Memorial, the University of Illinois at Chicago Medical Center and the University of Chicago hospitals were submitted to the federal government.

The government reportedly wants to determine if the three facilities listed patients as being in intensive care units when they weren’t sick enough to be there, and if Medicare and Medicaid were billed for the medical procedures.

If proven true, the allegations could result in civil or criminal penalties. The hospitals said any questions about their transplant practices were resolved in the late 1990s and that their programs are being run properly, the newspaper reported.

Alan Cubbage, NU’s vice president for university relations, said the administration has no comment on the allegations against Northwestern Memorial because the hospital isn’t directly affiliated with the university. Some Feinberg School of Medicine faculty work at the hospital and students can intern there, but the hospital is run by a separate administration, he said.

The 659-bed hospital, one of the largest private hospitals in Illinois, has other strong ties to the medical school. Northwestern Memorial is one of five facilities that compose the McGaw Medical Center of NU, a medical school affiliate. According to Feinberg’s Web site, the NU Medical Faculty Foundation partnered with the hospital to open an ambulatory care facility in 1999.

The federal prosecutor filed a request for the enforcement of a subpoena issued by the Department of Health and Human Services calling for records of audits dating back to 1995 by the United Network for Organ Sharing, which allocates organs through a government contract.

Court documents show the network gave minor discipline to the hospitals in the late 1990s in some of the cases cited in the audits, according to the article. But hospital officials at UIC said the issues had been resolved.

“We cooperated fully with UNOS in its review,” UIC spokesman Mark Rosati told the Sun-Times. “We are confident that our transplant program is administered properly in accordance with federal and state laws.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.