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May 20, 2024
McKinsey Can't Nix Pregnant Women's Claims In Opioid MDL
A California federal judge has cut some claims from multidistrict litigation seeking to hold McKinsey & Co. Inc. liable for infant neonatal abstinence syndrome caused by pregnant women's use of opioids, trimming fraud and nuisance-based claims, but allowing conspiracy and aiding-and-abetting claims to proceed against the consulting firm.
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May 20, 2024
Healthcare Futures Co. Sues Breakaway Ex-Members In Del.
A company seeking to develop what it described as the first healthcare futures exchange has sued two former managers in Delaware's Court of Chancery for pilfering intellectual property and other resources and then launching a competing venture.
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May 20, 2024
Rite Aid Settles Trademark Suit Over New Logo
Rite Aid has reached an agreement with Brand Design Co. to end a lawsuit claiming that the drugstore chain misused the design firm's font for a new logo, the parties have told a Pennsylvania federal court.
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May 20, 2024
Local Governments Seek Sanctions For PBMs In Opioid MDL
Four municipalities are asking an Ohio federal court overseeing the national opioid litigation to sanction pharmacy benefit managers Express Scripts Inc. and OptumRX Inc., saying they've willfully defied the court's order to provide complete responses to discovery requests.
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May 20, 2024
iRhythm Brass Face Suit Over FDA's Heart Monitor Inquiry
Several current and former directors and executives of medical technology company iRhythm are named in a shareholder derivative suit alleging they failed to disclose an inquiry by the Food and Drug Administration that found iRhythm's heavily touted and high-cost real-time heart monitoring device failed to meet the company's claims.
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May 20, 2024
J&J Says Beasley Allen Looking To 'Bias' Vote On $6.5B Plan
Johnson & Johnson's bankrupt talc unit accused the Beasley Allen Law Firm of attempting to intentionally "bias" the vote against its recently announced proposal to pay out $6.5 billion in a prepackaged reorganization plan to resolve claims that its talc-based baby powder causes ovarian cancer.
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May 20, 2024
Latham Hires 2 Skadden Healthcare Partners In DC
Latham & Watkins LLP has picked up two healthcare and life sciences partners from Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom LLP in Washington, D.C., the firm announced Monday.
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May 20, 2024
Patients Urge 9th Circ. To Deny UBH Petition In Claim Fight
Patients alleging United Behavioral Health mismanaged their mental health and substance use disorder treatment claims urged the Ninth Circuit not to grant the insurance company's petition for appellate court intervention in the consolidated action, arguing the effort was inappropriate and unjustified.
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May 20, 2024
Catching Up With Delaware's Chancery Court
Delaware was full of drama last week, as proposed changes to the state's corporate law statutes raised eyebrows and a professor's friend-of-the-court brief sparked a very unfriendly public exchange. Delaware's court of equity banged the gavel on pipeline and social media disputes, and shareholders filed new suits alleging insider trading, vote bungling, unfair stock buybacks and merger shenanigans. In case you missed any of it, here's the recap of all the top news last week from Delaware's Chancery Court.
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May 20, 2024
Northshore Unit Beats Employee's Vaccine Exemption Suit
A nurse working for a Northshore Health unit in Illinois cannot pursue employment deprivation claims over the hospital's initial rejection of her COVID-19 vaccine religious exemption request since she was granted the exemption on appeal, a federal judge said Friday.
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May 17, 2024
Med Mal Appeal Shot Down For Being 'Replete' With Errors
The daughter of a woman who died from bowel necrosis while awaiting surgery can't get a second shot at medical malpractice claims against several healthcare providers because of "significant noncompliance" with Indiana appellate court rules, a state appeals court has ruled.
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May 17, 2024
Allergan Says Deserted Drug Rule Weakens $680M Fraud Suit
Allergan drew a Maryland federal court's attention to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services' abandonment of a regulation clarifying drug pricing, arguing the move undermined a whistleblower's claims that it overcharged Medicaid by over $680 million.
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May 17, 2024
BCBS Says 'Clear' Contract Ends Ex-NBA Player's Suit
Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina pressed a state district court to throw out a lawsuit brought by retired NBA star Rodney Rogers that alleges in-home nursing was suddenly denied, arguing the "clear language" of his benefits doesn't provide for long-term, in-home nursing.
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May 17, 2024
OB-GYN Enough Like GYN Oncologist For Expert Witness Law
A Florida state appeals court on Friday revived a suit accusing a gynecological oncologist of performing an unnecessary surgery, saying the credentials of the patient's medical expert — an OB-GYN — satisfied the state's "same specialty" requirement.
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May 17, 2024
FCA Relators Seek Finders Fee For SpineFrontier Doc Deals
Three whistleblowers who tipped off the federal government to a medical device company's multimillion-dollar kickback scheme said Friday the Justice Department is refusing to pay them a cut of the $3 million in False Claims Act settlements paid by surgeons who admitted participating in the sham consulting ploy.
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May 17, 2024
Philly Surgeon Settles Sex Bias Case With Jefferson Hospital
An orthopedic surgeon who sued Thomas Jefferson University Hospital for gender discrimination over its handling of sexual assault allegations has settled his case with the hospital after a $15 million award in his favor was erased.
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May 17, 2024
Jury Convicts NC Provider In Medicaid, COVID Fraud Scheme
A clinical social worker in North Carolina was found guilty Friday of defrauding South Carolina's Medicaid program and falsely obtaining COVID-19 relief checks following a nine-day trial in Charlotte's federal courthouse, prosecutors said.
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May 17, 2024
Ga. OB-GYN Office Says Data Breach Class Action Falls Flat
An Atlanta OB-GYN practice has urged a Georgia federal judge to dismiss a proposed class suit over a data breach that allegedly impacted the personal and protected health information of tens of thousands of patients, arguing the lead plaintiff has failed to meet the requirements of the Class Action Fairness Act.
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May 17, 2024
Industry Emboldened After Justices Galvanize Agency Attacks
In the year since the U.S. Supreme Court said "extraordinary" and "far-reaching" attacks on administrative enforcers can skip agency tribunals and go straight to federal district court, ambitious challenges to regulatory powers are rapidly gaining traction, and the high court is poised to put them on an even firmer footing.
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May 17, 2024
Judge Bias Claim Can't Sink Mayo Clinic Ariz. Malpractice Win
An Arizona appellate court has affirmed a lower court bench ruling that let the Mayo Clinic in Arizona off the hook on malpractice claims lodged by a man who suffered serious complications after an abdominal procedure, in part ruling that he didn't show judicial bias requiring recusal.
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May 17, 2024
Texas Justices Let Fen-Phen Atty Malpractice Fight Roll On
The Texas Supreme Court ruled Friday that roughly 4,000 former clients of a Houston mass tort lawyer can continue pressing their claims that the lawyer improperly kept millions of dollars in fen-phen diet drug settlement money.
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May 17, 2024
UK Litigation Roundup: Here's What You Missed In London
This past week in London has seen a wave of claims filed against Verity Trustees Ltd., Harley-Davidson hit retailer Next with an intellectual property claim, Turkish e-commerce entrepreneur Demet Mutlu sue her ex-husband and Trendyol co-founder Evren Üçok and the Solicitors Regulation Authority file a claim against the former boss of collapsed law firm Axiom. Here, Law360 looks at these and other new claims in the U.K.
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May 17, 2024
Mass. Hospital Pays $24.3M To Settle Heart-Surgery FCA Case
Cape Cod Hospital will pay $24.3 million to settle claims it flouted Medicare billing rules for hundreds of heart-valve replacement surgeries in what's understood to be the largest recovery under the False Claims Act from a Massachusetts hospital.
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May 17, 2024
Many Plans Already In Front Of 11th Circ. Trans Health Ruling
The Eleventh Circuit's recent decision that a county health plan's coverage exclusion for gender transition surgery violated federal anti-discrimination law likely won't have a big impact on plans because they have already made adjustments for the U.S. Supreme Court ruling the appeals court applied, experts say.
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May 16, 2024
Ointment Scheme Conned Gov't Out Of Millions, Fla. Suit Says
Two Florida brothers and one of their former employees are accused of running a years-long fraudulent scheme billing government healthcare programs and receiving millions of dollars after paying kickbacks to generate prescriptions for ointments that were not needed, according to a False Claims Act lawsuit.
Expert Analysis
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Fears About The End Of Chevron Deference Are Overblown
While some are concerned about repercussions if the U.S. Supreme Court brings an end to Chevron deference in the Loper and Relentless cases this term, agencies and attorneys would survive just fine under the doctrines that have already begun to replace it, say Daniel Wolff and Henry Leung at Crowell & Moring.
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Former Minn. Chief Justice Instructs On Writing Better Briefs
Former Minnesota Supreme Court Chief Justice Lorie Gildea, now at Greenberg Traurig, offers strategies on writing more effective appellate briefs from her time on the bench.
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Stay Interviews Are Key To Retaining Legal Talent
Even as the economy shifts and layoffs continue, law firms still want to retain their top attorneys, and so-called stay interviews — informal conversations with employees to identify potential issues before they lead to turnover — can be a crucial tool for improving retention and morale, say Tina Cohen Nicol and Kate Reder Sheikh at Major Lindsey.
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Direct Claims Ruling May Alter Gov't Ties To Software Firms
A recent Federal Circuit decision allowing a software developer to pursue legal action under the Contract Disputes Act could change the government's relationship with commercial software providers by permitting direct claims, even in third-party purchase situations, say Dan Ramish and Zach Prince at Haynes Boone.
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AI In Accounting Raises OT Exemption Questions
A recent surge in the use of artificial intelligence in accounting work calls into question whether professionals in the industry can argue they are no longer overtime exempt under the Fair Labor Standards Act, highlighting how technology could test the limits of the law for a variety of professions, say Bradford Kelley at Littler and Stephen Malone at Peloton Interactive.
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What To Know About State-Level Health Data Privacy Laws
Companies that handle consumer health data, including those in the retail sector, should take a conservative approach when interpreting the scope of new health privacy laws in Washington, Nevada and Connecticut, which may include development of privacy notices, consent procedures, rights request response processes and processor contracts, say attorneys at Hunton.
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Opinion
Intoxicating Hemp Products: It's High Time For Clarity
Thanks to ambiguity in the 2018 Farm Bill, intoxicating hemp cannabinoid products are largely unregulated and are widely available without restrictions on who can buy the products, and although there are several possible solutions, voluntary industry action by good actors is the best option, say Andrew Kline and Tommy Tobin at Perkins Coie.
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HHS' Updated Tracking Tech Guidance Offers Little Clarity
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Office for Civil Rights' updated guidance on the use of online tracking technologies appears more focused on legal issues raised in ongoing litigation with the American Hospital Association and less on practical guidance for covered entities, say attorneys at Sheppard Mullin.
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What Rescheduling Could Mean For Cannabis Bankruptcies
Bankruptcy courts have historically been closed for cannabis-related businesses, but recent case law coupled with a possible reclassification of cannabis provides cautious optimism, say attorneys at Duane Morris.
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Opinion
Pharmacies Need More Protection Against PBM Fee Practices
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services' recent reform regarding direct and indirect remuneration fees will mitigate the detrimental effects that pharmacy benefit manager policies have on struggling pharmacies, but more is needed to prevent PBMs from exploiting loopholes, says Bhavesh Desai at Mazina Law.
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Series
Spray Painting Makes Me A Better Lawyer
My experiences as an abstract spray paint artist have made me a better litigator, demonstrating — in more ways than one — how fluidity and flexibility are necessary parts of a successful legal practice, says Erick Sandlin at Bracewell.
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Takeaways From The 2023 DOJ Fraud Section Report
Attorneys at Wiley discuss notable trends from the U.S. Department of Justice's recently reported Fraud Section activity last year and highlight areas of enforcement to watch for in the future, including healthcare fraud and Foreign Corrupt Practices Act violations.
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Hospitals Must Adapt To Growing Cybercrime Threats
As the tide of cybersecurity attacks targeting the healthcare industry continues to grow, hospitals and healthcare providers must take steps to protect themselves, including by replacing legacy records systems and ensuring that business associate agreements address responsibility for breaches, says Christine Chasse at Spencer Fane.
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Assessing FDA Pathways For Genome-Edited Plant Foods
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration's recent clarification of the regulatory pathways for foods produced from genome-edited plants seeks to strike a balance between public health and innovation, and may hold broader significance for developers of novel human foods subject to voluntary notification programs, say Emily Marden and Diane McEnroe at Sidley Austin.
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Opinion
Proposed MDL Management Rule Needs Refining
Proponents of the recently proposed Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 16.1 believe it may enhance efficiency in multidistrict litigation proceedings if adopted, but there are serious concerns that it could actually hinder plaintiffs' access to justice through the courts — and there are fundamental flaws that deserve our attention, says Ashleigh Raso at Nigh Goldenberg.