Articles and Blogs

On July 14, 2020, the Internal Revenue Service (the “IRS”), in response to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, issued Notice 2020-56 (the “Notice”) further postponing to December 31, 2020, the deadline for tax-exempt hospital organizations to complete a Community Health Needs Assessment (“CHNA”) and adopt an implementation strategy to meet the community health needs identified... READ MORE

On July 9, 2020, the Wisconsin Supreme Court held that the Wisconsin Department of Health Services’ (“DHS”) recoupment policy requiring ‘perfection’ in documentation was invalid and unenforceable. In Kathleen Papa and Professional Homecare Providers, Inc. v. DHS, 2020 WI 66, the Court clarified that DHS has the authority to recoup payments only when the... READ MORE

In an effort to ensure that skilled nursing homes (“SNFs”) can quickly and regularly test residents and staff for COVID-19, HHS announced the procurement of U.S. Food and Drug Administration authorized rapid point-of-care diagnostic test instruments and tests to be distributed to SNFs. HHS intends to initially distribute antigen testing instrument systems and tests... READ MORE

NATIONAL 3 strategic tips for radiology practices to emerge stronger from the pandemic 12 interesting health IT, innovation partnerships in 2020 Amazon launches primary care centers for employees CMS proposes dialysis payment rule CMS to Target Nursing Homes with Infection Control Problems in New COVID-19 Hotspots Coronavirus hospital data will now be sent to... READ MORE

On June 25, 2020, the Wisconsin Court of Appeals struck down a state statute permitting police to order warrantless blood draws from incapacitated drivers in State of Wisconsin v. Dawn M. Prado. This holding follows a U.S. Supreme Court ruling during the 2018 term that left unsettled whether Wisconsin’s implied consent law satisfies the... READ MORE

On June 30, 2020,  the Antitrust Division of the Department of Justice (“DOJ”), along with the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) issued a finalized version of their new Vertical Merger Guidelines (the “Guidelines”). The Guidelines do not institute many significant changes to the enforcer’s approach to analyzing vertical mergers but rather attempt to memorialize the... READ MORE

NATIONAL 34 hospital groups urge HHS to delay price disclosure start 98% of physicians avoid MIPS penalties 5 FDA approval decisions to watch in the 3rd quarter 77 hospitals that received $5M to $10M in PPP loans 10 big advancements in healthcare tech during the pandemic America’s 100 best hospitals, according to IBM Watson... READ MORE

Mergers and acquisitions in the health care industry present unique challenges that are not often present when undertaking transactions in other industries. Because of health care’s highly regulated nature, parties may falter if a health care transaction is not reviewed and negotiated carefully with respect to all of the components of health care regulation.... READ MORE

In April 2020, Hall Render published an article detailing state statutory, administrative and common law directives guiding commercial eviction and foreclosure actions during the COVID-19 pandemic. Two months later, the pandemic has far from subsided with many states reporting rising rates of new cases and experts predicting a second wave sometime in the fall,... READ MORE

CMS recently issued an update of a memorandum entitled “COVID-19 Emergency Declaration Blanket Waivers for Health Care Providers” (“Blanket Waiver Memo”) that announced additional blanket waivers for providers, including hospitals and skilled nursing facilities (“SNFs”) as a result of the COVID-19 public health emergency (“PHE”). The waivers have a retroactive effective date of March... READ MORE