As the delivery of health care continues to evolve and hospitals bear additional pressures to adapt to new payment models, more nonprofit hospitals are partnering with for-profit providers, through a sale, joint venture, or other arrangements. Partnerships between independent nonprofit hospitals and larger health care systems (nonprofit and for-profit) have been growing over the past two decades ...
A number of events have occurred recently involving the Federal Trade Commission and healthcare entities. First, garnering the lead spotlight, the FTC began presenting its case in the U.S. District Court for Northern Illinois to enjoin a merger between Advocate Health and NorthShore University HealthSystem, two large Chicago-area health systems ...
Last month, CMS issued a proposed rule that would drastically expand the agency’s authority to further its program integrity efforts through the provider and supplier enrollment process. This proposed rule, referred to as CMS-6058-P, (located in the Federal Register at 81 Fed. Reg. 40 ...
One of the issues an employer is obliged to consult on during a potential retrenchment process is the selection criteria to be applied when determining which employees will be dismissed and which will be retained. In doing so, the employer should aim to reach agreement with the other consulting party/parties on what the selection criteria should be ...
Obesity was not a disabilityThe judgment in the obesity case - which has caused quite a stir both in Denmark and the rest of the world - has finally been delivered.The case involved a Danish childminder who for more than 15 years had worked for a municipalitywhere he had provided childcare services in his own home. On 22 November 2010, the childminder was dismissed due to a decreased number of children in the municipality ...
According to the Danish Supreme Court's judgment of 17 March 2016, an employer's summary dismissal of an employee was justified due to the employee's use of his company mobile phone for the purchase of train tickets by means of an app, after which the expense was paid over the phone bill. The case involved an employee who - by virtue of his position as system developer - had been provided with a company mobile phone ...
This question was addressed by the Danish Board of Equal Treatment in its decision of 3 March 2016. The Board found that a provision in the staff manual - stipulating the termination of the employment relationship when the employee had reached the age of 70 - could not, as a matter of course, be considered to form part of the specific employment relationship ...
On April 18, the Office of Inspector General (“OIG”) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services issued revised guidance regarding exclusions imposed under section 1128(b)(7) of the Social Security Act ...
On April 19, 2016 Association of European Business (hereinafter – “AEB”) and the Russian Federal Antimonopoly Service (hereinafter – the “FAS”) presented the Code of Good Practice in the Pharmaceuticals Industry (hereinafter – the “Code”). The full text of the Code (both in Russian and English) is available at the official web-site of the antimonopoly authority (http://fas.gov.ru/documents/documentdetails.html?id=14513). Below is short outline of the Code. 1 ...
On April 27, 2016, Waller hosted the Middle Tennessee InfraGard Members Alliance’s Incident Response Briefing. The presenters highlighted increasing cybersecurity risks and the need for a proactive, coordinated approach to limit the impact of cybersecurity compromises. InfraGard is a partnership between the FBI and the private sector dedicated to sharing information and intelligence to prevent hostile acts against the United States ...
Karanović & Nikolić recently organised a workshop in cooperation with the Faculty of Law, under the title of "Managing Emotions in Labor Disputes – More than Law", as part of the Trial Simulation and Case Studies course ...
In a recent case, the Labour Court needed to consider the interplay between section 136 of the Companies Act, 2008 and section 189 of the Labour Relations Act, 1995 (“the LRA”). The latter section enables an employer to terminate an employee’s employment based on operational requirements. Section 136(1)(a) of the Companies Act provides that, during business rescue proceedings, employees will continue to be employed by the employer on the existing terms and conditions of employment ...
The U.S. International Trade Commission (“ITC”) recently issued a Final Determination concluding that certain dental implants imported by Instradent USA, Inc. and by JJGC Industria e Comercio de Materiais Dentarios S/A of Brazil (“Respondents”) infringe U.S. Patent Numbers 8,714,977 and 8,764,443 and should be blocked from entry into the United States ...
1 Which legislation sets out the regulatory framework for the marketing, authorisation and pricing of pharmaceutical products, including generic drugs? Which bodies are entrusted with enforcing these rules? The relevant legislation includes the following: • Law on Medicines 1996;
On May 11, 2016, OSHA issued a final rule, which is slated to go into effect January 1, 2017. This requires certain employers to electronically submit information regarding workplace injuries and illnesses. As with any new rule-making by OSHA, presumably legal challenges to the rule are on the way. Nonetheless, here are the relevant new provisions. Read the full alert ...
In 20141, major retailers Best Buy Canada Ltd., Costco Wholesale Canada Ltd., Gap (Canada) Inc., Old Navy (Canada) Inc., Guess? Canada Corporation, Wal-Mart Canada Corp., Toys ?R? Us Canada Ltd. and Curves International Inc ...
Following up on the passage of the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015 (MACRA), the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) recently issued a proposed rule to replace the Medicare sustainable growth rate (SGR) methodology which was repealed by MACRA. The proposed rule would implement the Merit-based Incentive Payment System (MIPS) to replace SGR and establish incentives for participation in Advanced Alternative Payment Models (Advanced APMs) ...
There’s no longer a basis to speculate or read or ignore the rumors. The Department of Labor (DOL) has finalized its changes to the regulations governing who may be exempt from being paid overtime. The changes will still be dramatic in terms of the number of employees impacted, but employers’ worst fears as to what they might contain did not quite materialize. Last Summer’s Proposed Regulations Early last summer, the DOL published its proposed changes to the overtime regulations ...
Last week, Waller co-hosted a roundtable discussion on interoperability with Brentwood Capital Advisors and were joined by healthcare IT companies, investors, providers and payors. Will Morrow, VP of HCA’s Health Insight Capital, and Hal Andrews, President of Healthcare for Digital Reasoning, kicked off the discussion with a case study on HCA’s work to achieve data interoperability and how HCA’s strategy led to its recent investment in Digital Reasoning ...
The Defend Trade Secrets Act of 2016 (DTSA) - arguably the most significant change to U.S. intellectual property laws in the past decade - was signed into law by President Obama on May 11, 2016. The DTSA creates a federal, civil remedy for misappropriation of a trade secret that is related to a product or service used in, or intended for use in, interstate or foreign commerce ...
One of the innovations introduced by the Companies Act, 71 of 2008 (“Companies Act”) is the mechanism of business rescue proceedings in South Africa. In particular, chapter 6 of the Companies Act was inserted to “provide for the efficient rescue and recovery of financially distressed companies, in a manner that balances the rights and interests of all relevant stakeholders” (see section 7(k)) ...
As the overall level of convergence between industries in the business world keeps increasing, it is only logical for the related legal aspects to follow suit every step of the way ...
One may say that Russian migration procedures are overly complicated but is it really so, especially for foreign nationals falling into the category of highly qualified specialists (the HQS)? In reality, the procedure is not so complicated. Its main peculiarity is that it is quite formalistic and requires attention to details of both the employer and the employee. Under the general rule, a foreign national planning to work in Russia shall have a work permit and work visa ...
The Hamburg data protection authority has imposed fines against the companies Adobe, Punica and Unilever, stating that they have continued to transfer personal data to the USA contrary to the stipulations of the Safe Harbor judgment. 1. The Safe Harbor judgment of the ECJ dated October 6, 2015 (legal matter C-362/14) makes it clear that European companies can no longer simply transfer personal data to the USA as a "non-secure third country" ...
