Articles and Blogs

Under the federal Stark Law, hospitals may provide non-monetary compensation to physicians up to an aggregate amount of $398 for calendar year 2017. The dollar limit for “medical staff incidental benefits” (e.g., meals, parking and other items or incidental services that are used on the hospital’s campus) is less than $33 per occurrence. Other requirements of the…Read More

Driven in part by retroactive fees imposed upon pharmacies by pharmacy benefit managers (“PBMs”) and compounded by recent high profile cases of significant price increases for relatively common drugs,1 both retail and institutional pharmacies have continued to push for enhanced prescription drug pricing transparency. Recent state and federal legislation, as well as lawsuits filed by coalitions of…Read More

Yesterday, the First Circuit Court of Appeals issued a new opinion in Universal Health Services, Inc. v. United States ex rel. Escobar.  Applying the materiality test enunciated by the Supreme Court in June, the First Circuit reaffirmed its previous decision that the whistleblowers’ complaint sufficiently stated a claim under the False Claims Act (“FCA”) to…Read More

DOL’s Final Rule Blocked On November 22, 2016, a federal district judge in Texas issued a nationwide preliminary injunction preventing the U.S. Department of Labor (“DOL”) from implementing and enforcing its final rule establishing new salary thresholds for millions of traditionally exempt white collar employees.  As we reported in July, that new rule, which was…Read More

On November 21, the EEOC announced the release of its updated Enforcement Guidance on National Origin Discrimination (“Guidance”), representing the first official guidance on this topic in 14 years. The new Guidance replaces the EEOC Compliance Manual, Volume II, Section 13: National Origin Discrimination, previously published in 2002. The Guidance may be accessed here. The EEOC…Read More

Congress Returns to Washington The House and Senate returned this week to begin the “lame duck” portion of the congressional calendar. The session is expected to run through December 9 at which point lawmakers will adjourn the 114th Congress. The only must-do item on the Congressional agenda is funding the federal government, which expires December…Read More

On November 14, 2016, the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (“USCIS”) published a revised Form I-9, Employment Eligibility Verification for use with all new hires. The new version (dated 11/14/2016) will be required for all employers on January 22, 2017. Until that date, employers may continue to use the older version (dated 03/08/2013), or…Read More

Election Threatens Future of the Affordable Care Act On November 8, Americans elected Donald J. Trump the 45th President of the United States and in doing so put the future of the Affordable Care Act (“ACA”) in serious jeopardy. Republicans retained control of the House of Representatives and held on to what is expected to…Read More

Executive Summary On November 10, 2016, the Office of the Inspector General (“OIG”) published its Work Plan for Fiscal Year (“FY”) 2017 (“Work Plan”). The Work Plan, published annually, describes OIG’s new and continuing audit and enforcement priorities for the upcoming year. The Work Plan is also useful in identifying corporate compliance risk areas and…Read More

On October 28, 2016, the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (“DHMH”) published its final regulations regarding hospitals’ and certain other health care facilities’ obligations to report certain actions involving physicians, allied health providers and naturopathic doctors.  The final regulations are codified at COMAR 10.32.22 and became effective November 7, 2016. As you may recall,…Read More