Policy & Compliance

  • April 02, 2024

    HHS Underlines Consent Priority For Pelvic, Prostate Exams

    New federal guidance that teaching hospitals and medical schools must have written consent before conducting pelvic, prostate, and other sensitive medical exams is a signal the agency has drawn a line on patient privacy and control, experts say.

  • April 02, 2024

    Medical Advocacy Orgs Ascend Amid Healthcare Court Battles

    The rapid ascent of an abortion case filed by the Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine illustrates the growing power of physician and provider advocacy groups to shape the nation's healthcare policy and legal debates.

  • April 02, 2024

    DOJ Sets Sights On 3rd Parties In Managed Care FCA Claims

    The Justice Department has sent a message in recent months, both in litigation and public speeches, that it plans to target third-party contractors and vendors whose actions contribute to the government being overbilled for medical care, even if they didn't submit those claims directly.

  • April 02, 2024

    Prosecutors Call Indicted Exec's Misconduct Claims 'Flawed'

    Prosecutors have asked a California federal judge to reject a bid for sanctions by a former healthcare CEO indicted on novel insider trading charges, arguing that his claims related to a separate case are based on "flawed grounds."

  • April 02, 2024

    SF City Atty Says Gov't Has Duty To Probe Hospital Rankings

    As law schools, medical schools and health systems continue to raise concerns over the veracity of annual rankings published by U.S. News and World Report, San Francisco City Attorney David Chiu is holding fast to his belief that his office has an important role to play in pushing for transparency from the publication. Here, he discusses the U.S. News suit against him and how his investigation fits into his office's consumer protection work.

  • April 01, 2024

    Ga., FTC Seek $17M+ Fine And Ban On Doc's Stem Cell Ads

    After securing an early win last week against a Georgia doctor and a series of companies that marketed stem cell therapy as a cure-all miracle treatment, federal regulators and the state of Georgia asked a federal judge Monday for $17.7 million in fines and an injunction barring the defendants from any future endeavors in the medical marketing industry.

  • April 01, 2024

    Swedish Match Sued Over Allegedly Youth Targeted Zyn Ads

    Philip Morris International and its subsidiary Swedish Match North America LLC have been hit with a putative class action from an unnamed California man alleging he became addicted to the company's Zyn smokeless oral nicotine pouches when he was a minor because of the product's marketing campaign.

  • April 01, 2024

    Ex-Pharma Co. Exec Denies Signing Noncompete Deal

    The former director of government sales for a pharmaceutical company asked the North Carolina Business Court on Friday to knock out a breach of contract claim in a lawsuit that alleges he took trade secrets to a competitor, arguing the company has no valid noncompete agreement to back it up.

  • April 01, 2024

    Cigna Can't Escape Patients' ERISA Fight Over Claim Rates

    A Connecticut federal judge agreed to trim a federal benefits lawsuit against Cigna alleging the company underpaid claims from providers who indirectly contracted with the insurer, finding allegations from participants in employer-sponsored health plans could proceed to discovery but that several medical associations lacked standing to sue.

  • April 01, 2024

    Fla. Justices Uphold Abortion Ban, Approve Pro-Choice Ballot Measure

    The Florida Supreme Court on Monday upheld a 15-week abortion ban in the state while also approving an initiative to preserve abortion access for placement on the ballot in November, leaving it to voters to decide the state's post-Dobbs future.

  • April 01, 2024

    Amazon's Disability Inclusion Efforts A Sham, Suit Says

    Amazon's stated commitments to disability inclusion are a sham, a California worker with cerebral palsy claimed in a proposed class action, saying the company gave him a warehouse gig despite his many warnings that he couldn't meet the job's physical demands.

  • March 29, 2024

    Calif. Justices Rule Living Wills Not A Path To Arbitration

    The California Supreme Court has unanimously ruled that an advance healthcare directive, or living will, does not permit a designated power of attorney to opt into arbitration on a patient's behalf, a decision that, while blessed by consumer groups, left some in the medical community "pretty disappointed."

  • March 29, 2024

    Hogan Lovells Vet's High Court Debut A Study In Contrasts

    Several weeks ago, when a Hogan Lovells lawyer finally delivered U.S. Supreme Court arguments after 20 years at the firm, she parsed arcane arbitration issues and her words weren't widely heard outside the courtroom. But weeks later and back at the high court podium, her words were heard nationwide when she pointedly spotlighted a judge's use of "anonymous blog posts" in a bombshell abortion ruling.

  • March 29, 2024

    Home Depot Asks High Court To Block $2.67B BCBS Deal

    Home Depot has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to take up its challenge of a $2.67 billion settlement in antitrust litigation targeting Blue Cross Blue Shield, saying the deal immunizes activity that hurts competition.

  • March 29, 2024

    Ohio Abortion Providers File Suit Over 24-Hour Wait Period

    A group of Ohio organizations filed a lawsuit Friday on behalf of abortion providers in the state, arguing certain longstanding abortion regulations violate amendments made to the state's constitution in November that protect access to abortion care.

  • March 29, 2024

    Retired Sidley Austin Atty Joins Pharma Group's Case

    A former Sidley Austin LLP attorney said Thursday that he is coming out of retirement to work for a pharmaceutical coalition in its push for protection from anti-kickback restrictions in a federal lawsuit.

  • March 28, 2024

    Medical Lab Inks $2.1M Deal To End NC's False Claims Probe

    A North Carolina lab will pay back $2.1 million to the state's Medicaid program after settling an investigation into how it charged the public health program for tests, the state attorney general's office announced Thursday.

  • March 28, 2024

    9th Circ. Won't Let Cigna Patients Appeal Class Cert. Denial

    The Ninth Circuit won't let a group of Cigna plan participants immediately appeal a trial court's rejection of class status in their lawsuit accusing the insurance giant of unlawfully colluding with its billing contractor to underpay out-of-network claims for mental health treatments.

  • March 28, 2024

    Implant Maker's Bribe Case Ripe For Trimming, Judge Says

    A money laundering charge levied against implant manufacturer SpineFrontier Inc. and its executives may be dropped from the broader bribery and kickback prosecution as a Boston federal judge Thursday struggled to square up how the company could have allegedly concealed the unlawful transfers to surgeons while also disclosing them publicly.

  • March 28, 2024

    Doctor Allowed To Withdraw NBA Fraud Plea, Gets June Trial

    A Manhattan federal judge will allow a Seattle-area doctor to pull back his guilty plea and go to trial in June, against prosecutors' objections, in a case alleging he assisted a cohort of retired NBA players to create fake invoices to submit to the league's healthcare plan.

  • March 28, 2024

    Grading Garland: Attys Give AG Mixed Reviews 3 Years In

    U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland's name won't be on the ticket in November, but his performance three years into his tenure is a subplot in the 2024 presidential election.

  • March 28, 2024

    Feds Finalize Restraints On Short-Term Health Insurance

    President Joe Biden's administration finalized regulations Thursday that shrink the window for short-term, limited-duration health insurance from three years to no more than four months, but it backed off more sweeping changes from its July proposal that would have affected fixed indemnity insurance.

  • March 28, 2024

    Romney Tells DEA Pot Review Must Heed Treaty Obligations

    Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, on Wednesday expressed skepticism about federal health regulators' recommendation to loosen marijuana restrictions and pressed the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration to explain how it would consider the drug's status in light of U.S. treaties.

  • March 27, 2024

    Idaho AG Won't Defend Abortion Stance, Confusing 9th Circ.

    The Idaho solicitor general insisted at a hearing before the Ninth Circuit Wednesday that the state's attorney general isn't "trying to be cute" by refusing to defend his expansive interpretation of Idaho's abortion ban in front of a baffled appellate panel.

  • March 27, 2024

    Ill. Court Revives Med Mal Suit Over Gauze Left In Sinus

    An Illinois appeals court has revived a woman's suit against her doctor and SIU Physicians & Surgeons Inc. over gauze that she alleges was negligently left in her sinuses after a procedure, finding there's a factual dispute over when the woman found out about the gauze.

Expert Analysis

  • Cross-Market Implications In FTC's Anesthesia Complaint

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    The Federal Trade Commission's recent complaint against a private equity firm's acquisition of anesthesiology practices highlights the controversial issue of cross-market harm in health care provider mergers, and could provide important insights into how a court may view such theories of harm, say Christopher Lau and Dina Older Aguilar at Cornerstone Research.

  • AI Can Help Lawyers Overcome The Programming Barrier

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    Legal professionals without programming expertise can use generative artificial intelligence to harness the power of automation and other technology solutions to streamline their work, without the steep learning curve traditionally associated with coding, says George Zalepa at Greenberg Traurig.

  • Preparing Law Students For A New, AI-Assisted Legal World

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    As artificial intelligence rapidly transforms the legal landscape, law schools must integrate technology and curricula that address AI’s innate challenges — from ethics to data security — to help students stay ahead of the curve, say Daniel Garrie at Law & Forensics, Ryan Abbott at JAMS and Karen Silverman at Cantellus Group.

  • ESG Around The World: South Korea

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    Numerous ESG trends have materialized in South Korea in the past three years, with impacts ranging from greenwashing prevention and carbon neutrality measures to workplace harassment and board diversity initiatives, say Chang Wook Min and Hyun Chan Jung at Jipyong.

  • General Counsel Need Data Literacy To Keep Up With AI

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    With the rise of accessible and powerful generative artificial intelligence solutions, it is imperative for general counsel to understand the use and application of data for myriad important activities, from evaluating the e-discovery process to monitoring compliance analytics and more, says Colin Levy at Malbek.

  • A Look At Healthcare Timelines Set By Biden's AI Order

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    President Joe Biden's artificial intelligence executive order establishes standards for using AI in the healthcare industry, including a number of staggered deadlines that should help coordinate a more unified federal approach to AI governance, say attorneys at Holland & Knight.

  • A Look At Successful Bid Protests In FY 2023

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    Attorneys at Sheppard Mullin look beyond the statistics in the U.S. Government Accountability Office’s recent annual report on bid protests, sharing their insights about nine categories of sustained protests, gained from reading every fiscal year 2023 decision in which the protester had a positive result.

  • Navigating Discovery Of Generative AI Information

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    As generative artificial intelligence tools become increasingly ubiquitous, companies must make sure to preserve generative AI data when there is reasonable expectation of litigation, and to include transcripts in litigation hold notices, as they may be relevant to discovery requests, say Nick Peterson and Corey Hauser at Wiley.

  • FDA's Lab-Developed Test Rule May Bring Historic Challenges

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    If finalized, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's proposed rule for regulating laboratory-developed tests will provoke some of the most interesting legal challenges that the agency has faced in decades, with outcomes that will likely reverberate across the agency's product centers, says Stacy Amin at MoFo.

  • Finding Focus: Strategies For Attorneys With ADHD

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    Given the prevalence of ADHD among attorneys, it is imperative that the legal community gain a better understanding of how ADHD affects well-being, and that resources and strategies exist for attorneys with this disability to manage their symptoms and achieve success, say Casey Dixon at Dixon Life Coaching and Krista Larson at Stinson.

  • AI Use May Trigger False Claims Act's Public Disclosure Bar

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    The likely use of publicly available artificial intelligence tools to detect government fraud by combing through large data sets will raise complex questions about a False Claims Act provision that prohibits the filing of claims based on previously disclosed information, say Nick Peterson and Spencer Brooks at Wiley Rein.

  • Beware Privacy Risks In Training AI Models With Health Data

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    Because data used to train artificial intelligence models may be protected by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act or other regulations, users of these models should conduct proper diligence to avoid costly compliance failures, say Neha Matta and Barbara Bennett at Frost Brown.

  • Unpacking GAO's FY 2023 Bid Protest Report

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    The U.S. Government Accountability Office's recent bid protest report reflects an increase in sustained protests, illustrating that disappointed offerors may see little reason to refrain from seeking corrective action — but there is more to the story, say Aron Beezley and Patrick Quigley at Bradley Arant.