Health

  • April 01, 2024

    Optical Co. Beats Investor Suit Over Pandemic Staffing Levels

    A Georgia federal judge has permanently tossed an investor suit accusing National Vision of failing to disclose issues with its staffing levels during the pandemic, saying the investors did not adequately plead that any of the challenged statements allegedly made by the optical company were false or misleading.

  • April 01, 2024

    Ga., FTC Seek $17M+ Fine And Ban On Doc's Stem Cell Ads

    After securing an early win last week against a Georgia doctor and a series of companies that marketed stem cell therapy as a cure-all miracle treatment, federal regulators and the state of Georgia asked a federal judge Monday for $17.7 million in fines and an injunction barring the defendants from any future endeavors in the medical marketing industry.

  • April 01, 2024

    'Unreliable' Theory Dooms City's Acthar Antitrust Cert. Bid

    The city of Rockford has presented "unreliable" damages evidence that cannot warrant giving class treatment to its claim that pharmacy benefits manager Express Scripts engaged in a scheme to fix prices for the seizure medication Acthar, an Illinois federal judge has said.

  • April 01, 2024

    Fed. Circ. Revives Challenges To J&J Schizophrenia Drug

    A Federal Circuit panel on Monday gave generics-makers Teva Pharmaceuticals USA Inc. and Viatris Inc. a new chance to prove that a patent on Johnson & Johnson's blockbuster schizophrenia drug Invega Sustenna is invalid, saying a lower court used an "erroneously rigid" analysis when rejecting their challenge.

  • April 01, 2024

    Catching Up With Delaware's Chancery Court

    Last week, Delaware's Court of Chancery saw a $42.5 million settlement, dismissal of two big suits with two more remanded back, and new cases from shareholders of Walt Disney, Donald Trump's Truth Social, Rivian Automotive and BarkBox.

  • April 01, 2024

    Ford Can Keep Pursuing Narrowed BCBS Antitrust Suit

    A Michigan federal judge has trimmed some of Ford Motor Co.'s time-barred claims alleging Blue Cross Blue Shield engaged in an anti-competitive scheme to drive up prices, but said the auto giant established it had standing to pursue allegations it was injured by market-restricting agreements among insurance licensees.

  • April 01, 2024

    Swedish Match Sued Over Allegedly Youth Targeted Zyn Ads

    Philip Morris International and its subsidiary Swedish Match North America LLC have been hit with a putative class action from an unnamed California man alleging he became addicted to the company's Zyn smokeless oral nicotine pouches when he was a minor because of the product's marketing campaign.

  • April 01, 2024

    Cigna Can't Escape Patients' ERISA Fight Over Claim Rates

    A Connecticut federal judge agreed to trim a federal benefits lawsuit against Cigna alleging the company underpaid claims from providers who indirectly contracted with the insurer, finding allegations from participants in employer-sponsored health plans could proceed to discovery but that several medical associations lacked standing to sue.

  • April 01, 2024

    Fla. High Court Says Voters Will Choose Whether To Legalize Pot

    Florida voters will have the opportunity to legalize recreational marijuana at the ballot box this November, after the state Supreme Court on Monday rejected a challenge brought by the state's attorney general and ruled that the proposal didn't violate a state rule restricting ballot measures to only one subject.

  • April 01, 2024

    Judge Won't Make EEOC Pay Atty Fees For Unsuccessful Suit

    The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission doesn't have to pay a Georgia hospital's attorney fees after jurors found in favor of the medical center on disability bias claims, a federal judge ruled, saying the jury's siding with the hospital didn't make the agency's suit frivolous.

  • April 01, 2024

    Lack Of Full Transcript Dooms Med Mal Verdict Appeal

    An Ohio state appeals panel has affirmed a verdict clearing a doctors' group from a woman's malpractice suit, saying without a full transcript of the trial, it can't conclude that the court was wrong to block her from presenting certain pieces of evidence.

  • April 01, 2024

    Fla. Justices Uphold Abortion Ban, Approve Pro-Choice Ballot Measure

    The Florida Supreme Court on Monday upheld a 15-week abortion ban in the state while also approving an initiative to preserve abortion access for placement on the ballot in November, leaving it to voters to decide the state's post-Dobbs future.

  • April 01, 2024

    Doctors Don't Have To Give Expert Opinions In Med Mal Suit

    A Pennsylvania federal judge has thrown out a man's suit seeking to force his doctors to provide an affidavit of merit for a malpractice suit, saying there's no legally recognized duty the doctors breached by refusing.

  • April 01, 2024

    Ore. Tax Court Upholds Nursing Home's $10.6M Valuation

    The owner of an Oregon nursing home did not present enough evidence to change the $10.6 million valuation found by a local assessor, the state tax court said.

  • March 29, 2024

    Petition Watch: Off-Label Ads, Retiree Discrimination & PPE

    A Utah attorney has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to determine whether allegedly retaliatory IRS summonses can be quashed, and two former pharmaceutical executives are challenging the constitutionality of their convictions for marketing the off-label use of a drug. Here, Law360 looks at recently filed petitions that you might've missed.

  • March 29, 2024

    Calif. Justices Rule Living Wills Not A Path To Arbitration

    The California Supreme Court has unanimously ruled that an advance healthcare directive, or living will, does not permit a designated power of attorney to opt into arbitration on a patient's behalf, a decision that, while blessed by consumer groups, left some in the medical community "pretty disappointed."

  • March 29, 2024

    Northern Texas Judges Won't Adopt Judge-Shopping Rule

    Judges with the Northern District of Texas have opted not to make any changes to how cases are assigned, despite a recent letter from Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer urging the district to implement an updated policy aiming to prevent litigants from judge shopping, the district's chief judge said Friday.

  • March 29, 2024

    Hogan Lovells Vet's High Court Debut A Study In Contrasts

    Several weeks ago, when a Hogan Lovells lawyer finally delivered U.S. Supreme Court arguments after 20 years at the firm, she parsed arcane arbitration issues and her words weren't widely heard outside the courtroom. But weeks later and back at the high court podium, her words were heard nationwide when she pointedly spotlighted a judge's use of "anonymous blog posts" in a bombshell abortion ruling.

  • March 29, 2024

    Judge Denies Injunction For Tyvaso Drug Competitor

    A D.C. federal judge Friday denied drugmaker United Therapeutics Corp.'s attempt to preemptively block the U.S. Food and Drug Administration from approving a new competitor to its blockbuster pulmonary hypertension medication Tyvaso, saying the company was effectively seeking to challenge an agency action before the FDA made one.

  • March 29, 2024

    4th Circ. Revives Data Breach Suit Against Medical Center

    The Fourth Circuit on Friday revived a proposed class action alleging that Sandhills Medical Foundation Inc. failed to protect the personal information of patients whose data was leaked following a cyberattack, saying the health care provider is not shielded under federal immunity and that the government cannot be substituted as a defendant.

  • March 29, 2024

    Home Depot Asks High Court To Block $2.67B BCBS Deal

    Home Depot has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to take up its challenge of a $2.67 billion settlement in antitrust litigation targeting Blue Cross Blue Shield, saying the deal immunizes activity that hurts competition.

  • March 29, 2024

    Judge Axes UpHealth's Claim Estimation Bid In Bankruptcy

    A Delaware bankruptcy judge denied UpHealth Holdings Inc.'s request to treat a potential liability claim as worth nothing, saying the company hadn't shown that the bankruptcy case would be hindered if a state court was left to decide the claim's value.

  • March 29, 2024

    Texas Doc Who Didn't Treat Patient Must Face Med Mal Suit

    A Texas state appellate court has declined to toss a suit accusing an emergency department doctor of negligently supervising a physician assistant who failed to diagnose a woman's stroke symptoms, saying a factual dispute exists regarding whether a physician-patient relationship was formed.

  • March 29, 2024

    Ohio Abortion Providers File Suit Over 24-Hour Wait Period

    A group of Ohio organizations filed a lawsuit Friday on behalf of abortion providers in the state, arguing certain longstanding abortion regulations violate amendments made to the state's constitution in November that protect access to abortion care.

  • March 29, 2024

    Hedge Fund Beats Vaxart Investor's 'Short-Swing' Profits Suit

    A New York federal judge has granted a win to hedge fund Armistice Capital LLC and its managing member in a derivative suit brought by a shareholder of biotechnology company Vaxart Inc., which sought disgorgement of short-swing profits that allegedly were wrongfully obtained by the investment adviser.

Expert Analysis

  • What Lawyers Must Know About Calif. State Bar's AI Guidance

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    Initial recommendations from the State Bar of California regarding use of generative artificial intelligence by lawyers have the potential to become a useful set of guidelines in the industry, covering confidentiality, supervision and training, communications, discrimination and more, say attorneys at Debevoise.

  • Industry Must Elevate Native American Women Attys' Stories

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    The American Bar Association's recent research study into Native American women attorneys' experiences in the legal industry reveals the glacial pace of progress, and should inform efforts to amplify Native voices in the field, says Mary Smith, president of the ABA.

  • White House Activity Is A Band-Aid For Regulating AI In Health

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    In the medium term, recent White House actions will have a greater impact on AI in the health care industry than Congress' sluggish efforts to regulate it, but ultimately legislation of AI's development and use in the health space will fall to Congress, say Wendell Bartnick and Vanessa Perumal at Reed Smith.

  • Understanding Discovery Obligations In Era Of Generative AI

    Excerpt from Practical Guidance
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    Attorneys and businesses must adapt to the unique discovery challenges presented by generative artificial intelligence, such as chatbot content and prompts, while upholding the principles of fairness, transparency and compliance with legal obligations in federal civil litigation, say attorneys at King & Spalding.

  • How Mental Health Ruling Paves Road For Equal Coverage

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    The Tenth Circuit’s recent ruling in E.W. v. Health Net, which clarified the pleading requirements necessary to establish a Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act violation, is a win for plaintiffs as it opens the door to those who have been denied coverage for behavioral health treatment to prove a mental health parity violation, says Mark DeBofsky at DeBofsky Law.

  • Employer Lessons After 2023's Successful Labor Strikes

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    Following recent historic strikes in the automotive, entertainment and health care industries, employers of all types can learn key insights about how unions may approach negotiations and strikes going forward, and nonunionized workplaces should anticipate a drive for increased union membership, say Lenny Feigel and Mark Neuberger at Foley & Lardner.

  • Why Criminal No-Poach Cases Can Be Deceptively Complex

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    Mark Rosman at Wilson Sonsini discusses the reasons many criminal no-poach cases that appear simple are actually more complicated than they seem, following several jury trial acquittals and two dismissed cases.

  • Kochava Ruling May Hint At Next Privacy Class Action Wave

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    The Southern District of California's recent ruling in Greenley v. Kochava and increasing complaints alleging that a consumer website is an illegal “pen register” due to the use of third-party marketing software tools foreshadow a new theory of liability for plaintiffs in privacy litigation, say attorneys at Crowell & Moring.

  • Series

    ESG Around The World: Mexico

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    ESG has yet to become part of the DNA of the Mexican business model, but huge strides are being made in that direction, as more stakeholders demand that companies adopt, at the least, a modicum of sustainability commitments and demonstrate how they will meet them, says Carlos Escoto at Galicia Abogados.

  • Opinion

    FDA And Companies Must Move Quickly On Drug Recalls

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    When a drug doesn't work as promised — whether it causes harm, like eyedrops recalled last month by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, or is merely useless, like a widely used decongestant ingredient recently acknowledged by the agency to be ineffective — the public must be notified in a timely manner, says Vineet Dubey at Custodio & Dubey.

  • The Case For Post-Bar Clerk Training Programs At Law Firms

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    In today's competitive legal hiring market, an intentionally designed training program for law school graduates awaiting bar admission can be an effective way of creating a pipeline of qualified candidates, says Brent Daub at Gilson Daub.

  • 10 Takeaways From New HHS Federal Compliance Guidelines

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    The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' recently issued general compliance program guidance is the first of its kind that would apply across all health care stakeholders, and signals the agency’s first step to improve and update existing compliance guidance, says Melissa Wong at Holland & Knight.

  • Ohio Voters Legalize Cannabis — What Comes Next?

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    This month, voters approved a citizen-initiated statute that legalizes marijuana for recreational use in Ohio, but the legalization timeline could undergo significant changes at the behest of the state's lawmakers, say Daniel Shortt and David Waxman at McGlinchey Stafford.

  • Opinion

    A Telecom Attorney's Defense Of The Chevron Doctrine

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    The Chevron doctrine, which requires judicial deference to federal regulators, is under attack in two U.S. Supreme Court cases — and while most telecom attorneys likely agree that the Federal Communications Commission is guilty of overrelying on it, the problem is not the doctrine itself, says Carl Northrop at Telecommunications Law Professionals.

  • 2 HHS Warnings Highlight Anti-Kickback Risks For Physicians

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    Two recent advisory opinions issued by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Office of Inspector General involve different scenarios and rationales, but together they illustrate the OIG's focus on and disapproval of contractual joint ventures and other revenue-maximizing physician arrangements, say Robert Threlkeld and Elliott Coward at Morris Manning.

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