Southwest Health Alliance (“Southwest”), an independent practice association with approximately 900 member-physicians, has agreed to a proposed order recently entered by the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) settling charges that it engaged in anticompetitive conduct in its dealings with insurers and other payors for the provision of physician services (collectively, “insurers” or “payors”) ...
A former GlaxoSmithKline attorney, Lauren Stevens, was acquitted on May 10 of all criminal charges stemming from her response to an FDA investigation. The acquittal, ordered by U.S. District Judge Roger W. Titus, is a stunning defeat for the government’s anti-fraud enforcement measures. The judge also severely rebuked the government’s efforts in the matter, stating the case should never have been prosecuted. Had she been convicted, Stevens would have faced a prison term of up to 60 years ...
Starting April 6, 2011 the Social Security Administration (SSA) resumed sending its “no-match” letters (or “decentralized correspondence (DECOR) letters”) to advise employers of reported social security numbers that do not coincide with SSA’s records. In 2007, SSA stopped sending DECOR letters due to federal litigation focused on an insert that the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE) wanted to include with the letters ...
On April 18, 2011, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) began the attestation phase under its $27 billion Medicare EHR Incentive Program. Incentive payments for the meaningful use of electronic health records (EHR) will begin in May 2011 and will continue over the next several years. Eligible professionals (i.e ...
On March 22, 2011, the Fifth Circuit ruled that the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (“USERRA”) does not support a cause of action for hostile work environment. This is the first ruling from any Circuit Court regarding the issue. USERRA, a federal statute that establishes rights for members of the National Guard and Reserve, applies to all public and private employers, regardless of size ...
On September 25, 2008, former President George W. Bush signed the ADA Amendments Act of 2008 (the “ADAAA” or the “Act”) into law, broadening the definition of “disability” under the Americans with Disability Act (“ADA”). The ADAAA makes it easier for people to establish that they are protected by the ADA and overturns holdings in several well-known Supreme Court decisions, which had previously narrowed the “disability” definition ...
Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) will face large start-up costs under proposed rules issued on March 31, 2011 by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), with an uncertain outlook for savings and even possible losses. An ACO is an organization of health care providers that agrees to be accountable for cost, quality and the overall care of Medicare beneficiaries who are assigned to it ...
According to an old Russian Proverb, “A spoken word is not a sparrow. Once it flies out, you can’t catch it.” Applying this to the employment context, if an employee verbally complains that his employer is violating the FLSA, is the employee protected from retaliation? Deciding a split among the circuit courts, the Supreme Court answered the question affirmatively, eliminating the need for a net: the FLSA protects employees who file oral complaints. Kasten v ...
How is health care in your jurisdiction organised? The basic principles of the organisation of the health-care system are governed by Act CLIV of 1997 (the Health-care System Act), more specifically by sections 141 et seq. Pursuant to section 141, the state is ultimately responsible for the state of health of the population, and for the creation of a system that protects, promotes and – if necessary – restores it ...
The Office for Civil Rights (OCR) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has recently announced two significant enforcement actions against health care providers for violating the HIPAA Privacy Rule. In the first matter, Cignet Health Care of Prince George’s County, MD was fined $4.3 million for failure to provide patients with access to their health records and for failing to cooperate with the ensuing OCR investigation ...
Employers across the country are encountering problems with successful completion of the I-9 Form, a one-page form required to verify employment eligibility of workers in the United States. Despite internal audits and I-9 training, employers continue to identify errors on their I-9 Forms. Each I-9 error is treated as a separate violation resulting in a hefty fine ...
In a case decided last week, Staub v. Proctor Hospital, a unanimous United States Supreme Court finally addressed the application of the “cat’s paw” theory of liability to employment discrimination claims, holding that an employer can be liable for an employment action motivated by a non-decision maker’s discriminatory animus ...
The decision by an employer to offer a pension plan to its employees is an important one. Various types of pension plans may be offered, and the financial risk of the employer depends on the type of plan chosen.While unions and employees generally prefer defined benefit pension plans,(1) employers are now very reluctant to implement such plans because of the financial liability they entail ...
The facts of the case In 1987, the Hudson’s Bay Company (“HBC”) sold one of its divisions to the North West Company (“NWC ”). In the context of that transaction, some 1,200 HBC employees were transferred to NWC (the “Transferred Employees”). On October 7, 2010, the Supreme Court of Canada rendered its judgment in the Burke v. Hudson’s Bay Co. case ...
The business community has been placed on notice. OSHA has been actively pursuing its regulatory agenda, while also arming its arsenal to enforce compliance. This alert explores the highlights of OSHA’s initiatives in 2010 and what companies can expect in 2011. OSHA 2010: Expanded Enforcement and an Active Commission OSHA’s efforts throughout 2010 included expanded enforcement, a negative publicity campaign, and clearance of several legacy cases from the OSHA Review Commission (“OSHRC”) docket ...
OSHA is implementing several changes to its administrative penalty calculation system. Many of the agency's current penalty adjustment factors have been in place since the early 1970's, resulting in penalties which are often too low to have an adequate deterrent effect. Administrative penalty adjustments will therefore be made to several factors which impact the final penalty issued to employers. These factors include: 1 ...
Combined EAD/Advance Parole Cards Citing security and durability, USCIS announced last week that it is issuing combined employment and travel authorization on one card. Currently, applicants are issued two separate approval documents – a card for employment authorization and a paper approval for advance parole ...
Over the last ten years, Quebec society has frequently been called on to establish means for integrating human rights in the workplace, particularly with respect to accommodation matters ...
Here we go again! Consistent with its retaliation decisions over the past five years, the United States Supreme Court has revisited and expanded the scope of protection from retaliation under Title VII. In an 8-0 decision issued January 24, 2011, the high court expanded the scope of Title VII’s anti-retaliation provision by concluding that in certain situations, the statute allows an employee who has not personally engaged in protected activity to lodge a retaliation claim under the statute ...
The Obama National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB”)1 has started to make its mark on the labor laws through a series of changes that collectively may have a significant impact on the labor law environment ...
After launching a National Emphasis Program (“NEP”) on recordkeeping in 2009, OSHA has focused increasingly more on recordkeeping compliance when conducting workplace inspections. Recently, the Assistant Secretary of Labor, David Michaels, noted that the recordkeeping NEP has supposedly uncovered recordkeeping violations in almost 60 percent of the 192 inspections OSHA has carried out to date under the program ...
HARMONIZATION OF CLINICAL RESEARCH CONTRACTS IN QUEBEC OLGA FARMAN and MARIE-ÈVE CLAVET [email protected] [email protected] Over the past few decades, a high-quality system of research and innovation has been built in the Province of Quebec. The contractual research conducted by university-affiliated health-care institutions in Quebec has become a fundamental scientific, economic and social activity ...
“Never a dull moment” – 2010 was an eventful year for Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”) jurisprudence in the Fifth Circuit and across the country ...
February 20, 2011, will bring a significant additional burden for many employers using the H-1B, H-1B1 Chile/Singapore, L-1 or O-1A category to sponsor a worker. Petitioners, even those entities not typically involved with technology subject to U.S. Government export rules, will be required to make an export control compliance statement under penalty of perjury on USCIS Form I-129. The statement is to certify that the foreign employee will not be allowed access to controlled U.S ...
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission received more than 12,000 charges in 2009 from employees claiming sexual harassment—a 6 percent increase from three years ago. Although harassment claims are on the rise, Haynes and Boone continues to secure significant sexual harassment victories for its clients, and employers overall ...
