Articles and Blogs

This week a Court in the Middle District of Florida dealt a blow to a whistleblower’s allegations of fraud in U.S. ex rel. Baklid-Kunz v. Halifax Hospital Medical Center ruling that: (1) the Relator is barred from recovering damages even if it can prove its allegations and (2) the Relator is barred from arguing or... READ MORE

CMS Releases Home Health Proposed Rule On July 1, CMS issued a proposed rule that would trim Medicare payments to home health agencies by 0.3% in 2015.  The cut reflects the second of four years of “rebasing” home health payments as required by the ACA. The CMS proposal also changes the rules regarding face-to-face encounters... READ MORE

On several occasions over the past year, the IRS has publicly expressed its intention to clear a significant backlog of exemption applications.  With its July 1 release of Form 1023-EZ, a shorter exemption application form for small nonprofits, the IRS took a significant step towards reducing this backlog. READ MORE

Executive Summary Health care providers can significantly manage the risk posed by retained overpayments under the False Claims Act (“FCA”) by requesting counsel to conduct appropriate compliance investigations rather than performing the investigations internally. READ MORE

On Monday, June 30, 2014, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a 5-4 decision in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc., et al., that extends certain religious freedom protections to closely held for-profit corporations.  Specifically, the Supreme Court ruled that the Federal Government cannot impose the contraceptive mandate on closely held for-profit corporations that have... READ MORE

With the passing of the Affordable Care Act (“ACA”), False Claims Act (“FCA”) observers noted the imminent filing of cases alleging violations of the ACA’s amendments to the FCA or “reverse” false claims. Such claims are per se false claims under the FCA and arise when a government contractor or health care provider becomes aware... READ MORE

The NLRB and President Obama both took a hit last week from the Supreme Court when the Justices ruled unanimously that the President’s appointment of three members of the NLRB during a recess of the Senate was unconstitutional.  We wrote about this legal challenge to presidential power previously as the case made its way... READ MORE

Governor Scott Walker recently signed into law the HIPAA Harmonization – Mental Health Care Coordination Act (2013 WI Act 238, the “Act”).  The Act is intended to alleviate barriers to coordination of care for patients receiving mental health treatment by aligning aspects of Wisconsin’s mental health privacy laws with the Federal Health Insurance Portability... READ MORE

Yesterday, the D.C. Circuit issued a much-anticipated decision regarding whether or not internal compliance investigations were privileged. Two recent lower court decisions had ruled that such compliance investigations were not privileged because they were for business rather than legal purposes. The D.C. Circuit disagreed and found that such compliance investigations are for legal purposes... READ MORE

The Eighth Circuit affirmed that a Missouri regulatory commission’s publication of hearing testimony was “news media” sufficient to trigger the False Claims Act’s public disclosure bar. The False Claims Act includes a provision that bars FCA actions by qui tam relators if the subject matter of the action has been sufficiently disclosed by a... READ MORE