Health

  • July 12, 2024

    Widower Drops Suit Over Surgical Robot-Related Death

    A widower agreed Thursday to drop his suit against Intuitive Surgical Inc. over an alleged defect in its da Vinci surgical robots that allowed electricity to arc during his wife's surgery, burning her small intestine and leading to her death.

  • July 12, 2024

    Chancery Approves $19.5M Convey-TPG Settlement

    Former shareholders of Convey Health Solutions Inc. won Delaware Chancery Court approval Friday of a $19.5 million cash settlement to resolve a class challenge to the healthcare technology company's $1.1 billion take-private acquisition by TPG Inc., with $3.88 million going to class attorneys after expenses.

  • July 12, 2024

    7 Gender-Affirming Care Cases To Watch In 2024's 2nd Half

    The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to review a constitutional challenge by the federal government to Tennessee's ban on gender-affirming care for minors, while other appeals courts are weighing the constitutionality of states' and employers' restrictions on gender dysphoria treatment. Here are seven cases involving gender-affirming care access that attorneys will be tracking in the second half of the year.

  • July 12, 2024

    Biggest Colorado Decisions Of 2024: A Midyear Report

    The U.S. Supreme Court's quick reversal of Colorado justices' decision removing former President Donald Trump from the state's ballots and a Boulder County judge's ruling clearing the way for landmark climate litigation about major oil companies rank among the most important decisions affecting Colorado so far this year.

  • July 12, 2024

    Biggest Washington Decisions Of 2024: A Midyear Report

    The first half of 2024 in Washington courts was punctuated by a fizzled startup's $72 million trial win against The Boeing Co., and Monsanto Co.'s appellate reversal of a $185 million verdict in one of a series of high-profile PCB poisoning cases. Here is a closer look at some of the biggest decisions in Washington state and federal courts in the first half of 2024.

  • July 12, 2024

    Healthcare SPAC Launches $200M IPO To Pursue Acquisition

    Launch One Acquisition Corp. began trading Friday after raising a $200 million initial public offering, represented by Ellenoff Grossman & Schole LLP and underwriters counsel King & Spalding LLP, joining an uptick in special-purpose acquisition companies targeting the healthcare sector.

  • July 12, 2024

    Ex-Ga. Insurance Chief Gets 3½ Years For Kickback Scheme

    John Oxendine, the former four-term Georgia insurance commissioner who pled guilty this year to working with a doctor to run a multimillion-dollar medical testing kickback scheme, was hit with a 3½-year prison sentence by a Georgia federal judge Friday.

  • July 12, 2024

    FTC Says Abandoned Novant Deal Moots Lower Court Loss

    The Federal Trade Commission is looking to unravel a North Carolina federal judge's order allowing Novant's planned $320 million hospital merger to advance after it subsequently abandoned the deal, telling the Fourth Circuit the appeal is moot and the order should be vacated.

  • July 11, 2024

    Wash. Justices Revive Proposed Class Suit Over Nurse Wages

    The Washington Supreme Court on Thursday said a nurse's wage theft suit against a hospital can proceed even though his claims are the same as the ones lodged by his union in a tossed suit, finding it would be in the best interest of both efficiency and justice.

  • July 11, 2024

    Judge Won't Permit Florida's Trans Care Ban Pending Appeal

    A federal judge denied Florida's request Thursday to pause a court order blocking a state law that bans or restricts gender-affirming care for transgender minors and adults while it challenges the ruling at the Eleventh Circuit, finding the state hasn't shown it would be harmed by the law's stagnation.

  • July 11, 2024

    Senate Clears Patent Bill Aiming To Lower Drug Prices

    The U.S. Senate on Thursday passed a bill that would pump the brakes on the ability of pharmaceutical companies to steer patients away from generic versions of a drug, a measure that lawmakers said would lower drug costs.

  • July 11, 2024

    Panel Says Kansas BCBS Unit Can't Face Rehab Suit In Colo.

    A Kansas Blue Cross Blue Shield unit can't be sued in Colorado for terminating the coverage of a patient who was receiving treatment for an autoimmune syndrome, a state appellate panel ruled Thursday.

  • July 11, 2024

    Cigna Objects To Ch. 11 Nursing Home Asset Sale Proposal

    Cigna Health and Life Insurance Co. asked a Pennsylvania bankruptcy judge to reject a sale process proposed by some of the debtors in a Pittsburgh-area nursing home network's consolidated Chapter 11 case, saying it gave the debtors too much leeway to change what contracts they will maintain.

  • July 11, 2024

    Social Media Arbitration Row Not For La. Court, 5th Circ. Told

    A coalition of researchers told the Fifth Circuit that a Louisiana court was wrong to rule that a proposed class of plaintiffs who claim the group was behind social media censorship in 2020 did not have to arbitrate their claims, arguing that the court should have weighed whether it could even hear the case before considering arbitration.

  • July 11, 2024

    NJ Justices Back Expert Report In Mother's Suit Over Death

    The New Jersey Supreme Court on Thursday reinstated a lawsuit against a Garden State hospital by the mother of a diabetic patient who died, saying the trial court erred in dismissing the case on grounds that an affidavit of merit was insufficient.

  • July 11, 2024

    Signify, Merger Partner Clash In Chancery Over $50M Earnout

    An attorney for former Caravan Health Inc. stockholder representatives told a Delaware vice chancellor on Thursday that acquirer Signify Health Inc. sabotaged Caravan's business in order to scuttle an obligation to add as much as $50 million in performance-based "earnouts" to the $250 million merger price.

  • July 11, 2024

    4 Big Gender-Affirming Care Decisions From 2024's 1st Half

    The U.S. Supreme Court allowed an Idaho law banning gender-affirming care for minors to become effective, the Eleventh Circuit upheld a trial court win for a transgender public safety employee in a healthcare discrimination suit and a Florida federal judge blocked as unconstitutional a state law restricting gender-affirming care for minors and adults.

  • July 11, 2024

    9th Circ. Signals Dr.'s Vax-Refusal Case Deserves New Chance

    Ninth Circuit judges signaled Thursday that they were likely to revive a doctor's case claiming he was wrongfully fired from his Washington State University residency for refusing to get a COVID-19 vaccination, with two judges questioning if the school went far enough to accommodate his religious beliefs.

  • July 11, 2024

    Staffing Claim Against Kaiser Will Go To Trial, Judge Says

    A United Food and Commercial Workers local can continue litigating its claim that Kaiser Permanente affiliates violated provisions in labor contracts guaranteeing adequate staffing, a Colorado federal judge ruled, saying there are outstanding issues to be resolved at trial.

  • July 11, 2024

    Calif.'s Insulin Cost Suit Belongs In Fed. Court, 9th Circ. Told

    Express Scripts and Caremark PCSHealth urged the Ninth Circuit on Thursday to reverse a lower court's order sending California's antitrust suit over skyrocketing insulin prices back to state court, with both appellants' counsel arguing the state's claims involve disputes over federal contracts and regulations that must be resolved in federal court.

  • July 11, 2024

    Rite Aid Gets OK To Sell Interests In Its Loan To MedImpact

    A New Jersey bankruptcy judge on Thursday approved Rite Aid's sale of most of its interests in a $567 million loan that it made, the proceeds of which it will distribute to creditors under its Chapter 11 reorganization plan.

  • July 11, 2024

    $435M Yale Hospital Merger Case Set For December Jury Trial

    A lawsuit claiming that Yale New Haven Health Corp. is trying to back out of a $435 million deal to buy three Connecticut hospitals will go to a bench trial in December after a state court judge approved the parties' proposed schedule.

  • July 11, 2024

    Opiate MDL Judge Flags Evidence Preservation Shortfall

    An Ohio federal judge has said "at least some" of the plaintiff local government entities in four chosen bellwether cases against pharmacy benefit managers for the multidistrict litigation over the opioid epidemic failed to preserve documents and evidence for trial, warning the parties he may replace those cases.

  • July 11, 2024

    Chancery Fast-Tracks Blue Cross Data Co. Suit, Denies TRO

    An independent licensee of Blue Cross Blue Shield Association that accused a customer of sharing confidential data with industry competitor Cigna Corp. got its Delaware Chancery Court lawsuit fast-tracked Thursday but failed to get immediate injunctive relief because the harms it alleged were too "speculative."

  • July 11, 2024

    Trans Worker Seeks Facial Hair Removal In ERISA Suit

    A transgender woman said her employer's health benefit plan administered by UnitedHealthcare refused to cover facial hair removal as part of her gender-affirming care in violation of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act, according to a complaint filed in Washington federal court.

Expert Analysis

  • CORRECTED: Endoscope Patent Case Offers Guidance On Right To Repair

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    An Alabama federal court's decision in Karl Storz v. IMS reaffirmed that product owners have broad rights to repair or modify their property as they see fit, highlighting the parameters of the right to repair in the context of patent infringement, say Dustin Weeks and Dabney Carr at Troutman Pepper. Correction: Due to an editing error, a previous version of this article and headline attributed the Karl Storz ruling to the wrong court. The error has been corrected.

  • Trump's NY Civil Fraud Trial Spotlights Long-Criticized Law

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    A New York court’s recent decision holding former President Donald Trump liable for fraud brought old criticisms of the state law used against him back into the limelight — including its strikingly broad scope and its major departures from the traditional elements of common law fraud, say Mark Kelley and Lois Ahn at MoloLamken.

  • Opinion

    Requiring Leave To File Amicus Briefs Is A Bad Idea

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    A proposal to amend the Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure that would require parties to get court permission before filing federal amicus briefs would eliminate the long-standing practice of consent filing and thereby make the process less open and democratic, says Lawrence Ebner at the Atlantic Legal Foundation and DRI Center.

  • 2 Recent Suits Show Resiliency Of Medicare Drug Price Law

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    Though pharmaceutical companies continue to file lawsuits challenging the Inflation Reduction Act, which enables the federal government to negotiate for lower prescription drug prices, recent decisions suggest that the reduced drug prices are likely here to stay, says Jose Vela Jr. at Clark Hill.

  • 4 Ways To Motivate Junior Attorneys To Bring Their Best

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    As Gen Z and younger millennial attorneys increasingly express dissatisfaction with their work and head for the exits, the lawyers who manage them must understand and attend to their needs and priorities to boost engagement and increase retention, says Stacey Schwartz at Katten.

  • Decoding The FTC's Latest Location Data Crackdown

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    Following the Federal Trade Commission's groundbreaking settlements in its recent enforcement actions against X-Mode Social and InMarket Media for deceptive and unfair practices with regards to consumer location data, companies should implement policies with three crucial elements for regulatory compliance and maintaining consumer trust, says Hannah Ji-Otto at Baker Donelson.

  • Defense Attys Must Prep For Imminent AI Crime Enforcement

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    Given recent statements by U.S. Department of Justice officials, white collar practitioners should expect to encounter artificial intelligence in federal criminal enforcement in the near term, even in pending cases, say Jarrod Schaeffer and Scott Glicksman at Abell Eskew.

  • Lessons For Nursing Facilities From DOJ Fraud Settlement

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    The U.S. Department of Justice's recent settlement with the owner of skilled nursing and assisted living facilities in Florida provides a cautionary tale of potential fraud risks, and lessons on how facilities can mitigate government enforcement actions, say Callan Stein and Rebecca Younker at Troutman Pepper.

  • Planning For Healthcare-Private Equity Antitrust Enforcement

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    U.S. antitrust agency developments could mean potential enforcement actions on healthcare-related acquisitions by private equity funds are on the way, and entities operating in this space should follow a series of practice tips, including early assessment of antitrust risks on both the state and federal level, say Ryan Quillian and John Kendrick at Covington.

  • 3 Health Insurance Paths For Psychedelic-Assisted Therapy

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    Ahead of potential U.S. Food and Drug Administration approvals for psychedelics as insured treatments, attorneys at Husch Blackwell review pathways for these drugs to achieve coverage as treatments for complex mental health conditions.

  • Series

    Serving As A Sheriff's Deputy Made Me A Better Lawyer

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    Skills developed during my work as a reserve deputy — where there was a need to always be prepared, decisive and articulate — transferred to my practice as an intellectual property litigator, and my experience taught me that clients often appreciate and relate to the desire to participate in extracurricular activities, says Michael Friedland at Friedland Cianfrani.

  • Bid Protest Spotlight: Nonprecedential, Unreasonable, Scope

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    James Tucker at MoFo examines three recent decisions showing that while the results of past competitions may inform bid strategy, they are not determinative; that an agency's award may be deemed unreasonable if it ignores available information; and that a protester may be right about an awardee's noncompliance but still lose.

  • Fears About The End Of Chevron Deference Are Overblown

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    While some are concerned about repercussions if the U.S. Supreme Court brings an end to Chevron deference in the Loper and Relentless cases this term, agencies and attorneys would survive just fine under the doctrines that have already begun to replace it, say Daniel Wolff and Henry Leung at Crowell & Moring.

  • Former Minn. Chief Justice Instructs On Writing Better Briefs

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    Former Minnesota Supreme Court Chief Justice Lorie Gildea, now at Greenberg Traurig, offers strategies on writing more effective appellate briefs from her time on the bench.

  • Stay Interviews Are Key To Retaining Legal Talent

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    Even as the economy shifts and layoffs continue, law firms still want to retain their top attorneys, and so-called stay interviews — informal conversations with employees to identify potential issues before they lead to turnover — can be a crucial tool for improving retention and morale, say Tina Cohen Nicol and Kate Reder Sheikh at Major Lindsey.

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