OMW Health Law

1st Circuit Court of Appeals Upholds Tax Refund In False Claims Act Case

Adam Snyder — Mon, 18 Aug 2014 23:10:27 +0000

The United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit upheld the district court’s decision allowing Fresenius Medical Care Holdings, Inc. (f/k/a National Medical Care, Inc.) to deduct $95 Million from a $385 Million dollar civil settlement under the False Claims Act (“FCA”). Accordingly, the First Circuit affirmed the district court’s tax refund judgment in […]

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Washington Supreme Court Bans “Psychiatric Boarding”

Lee W. Kuo — Fri, 08 Aug 2014 21:20:24 +0000

On August 7, 2014, the Washington State Supreme Court ruled that “psychiatric boarding” under Washington’s Involuntary Treatment Act (“ITA”) is unlawful. “Psychiatric boarding” is a term used to describe the practice of leaving mentally ill patients in hospital emergency rooms because there is no space at certified evaluation and treatment facilities. Certified evaluation and treatment […]

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Surviving A Motion to Dismiss False Claims Act Suit

Greg Montgomery — Fri, 08 Aug 2014 02:55:26 +0000

A federal district court recently denied defendant’s motion to dismiss a false claims act lawsuit, concluding that the realtor had alleged a sufficiently detailed factual basis for the claims and provided representative examples of the alleged false claims. The complaint, filed by a nurse anesthesiologist, alleged that the defendant had violated (and was continuing to […]

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Delay in Return of Overpayments Leads to False Claims Act Suit

Greg Montgomery — Wed, 23 Jul 2014 21:24:55 +0000

The generally accepted wisdom is to move expeditiously to investigate and return federal health care program overpayments once you become aware of them. Now we know the potential downside of failing to do so even when all overpayments are eventually returned. Late last month the United States Attorney’s Office filed a false claims act complaint […]

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WA Certificate of Need Waiver for Psych Beds

Elana Zana — Fri, 18 Jul 2014 15:32:44 +0000

The Washington Certificate of Need (“CN”) Program recently announced a temporary change in the CN requirements for acute care hospitals to change the use of existing licensed beds to psychiatric care beds. Acute care hospitals choosing to convert some of their acute care beds to psychiatric beds will not have to undergo the CN review process. […]

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AMA Adopts Telemedicine Guidelines

Lee W. Kuo — Thu, 26 Jun 2014 00:07:37 +0000

On June 11, 2014, the American Medical Association (“AMA”) approved a list of guiding principles regarding the practice of telemedicine. The AMA’s adoption of the telemedicine guiding principles follows the trend of position statements, guidelines, and other policy statements addressing the practice of telemedicine already adopted by other medical specialty societies and state medical associations, […]

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Violation of Privacy Rule Leads to $800,000 HIPAA Settlement

Jefferson Lin — Mon, 23 Jun 2014 22:44:40 +0000

Indiana-based Parkview Health System (“Parkview”) has agreed to settle potential violations of the HIPAA Privacy Rule with the HHS Office for Civil Rights (“OCR”) by paying $800,000 and adopting a corrective action plan to address deficiencies in its HIPAA compliance program. The resolution agreement can be found here. According to the HHS press release, the […]

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Rady HIPAA Breach – Access Controls & Training

Elana Zana — Thu, 19 Jun 2014 17:03:58 +0000

Rady Children’s Hospital in San Diego announced this week that it has discovered two instances of impermissible disclosure of patient information – both disclosures arising from employees sending spreadsheets containing PHI to job applicants. Surprisingly, Rady employees did not learn the lesson from their northern California neighbor, Stanford, which recently settled a lawsuit for $4 […]

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Meaningful Use EP Hardship Exception Deadline – July 1, 2014

Elana Zana — Thu, 12 Jun 2014 15:22:27 +0000

Not able to meet meaningful use this year? You may qualify for a hardship exception. Eligible professionals that qualify for certain hardship exceptions can avoid the meaningful use payment adjustments in 2015 by submitting to CMS the 2015 Hardship Exception Application. CMS has permitted the EPs to apply for a hardship exception based on the […]

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CMS Proposed Revisions to Meaningful Use – A Welcome Delay

Elana Zana — Wed, 21 May 2014 18:23:41 +0000

CMS has issued proposed revisions to meaningful use Stages 2 and 3 in response to numerous industry complaints that hospitals and provider groups will not be able to implement the 2014 certified EHR technology with enough time to meet meaningful use in 2014. CMS, recognizing that EPs and hospitals are either using 2011 CEHRT, 2014 CEHRT, […]

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