Policy & Compliance

  • February 24, 2026

    Mallinckrodt's Ch. 11 Blocks Antitrust Payouts, Judge Rules

    A Connecticut federal judge has ruled that drugmaker Mallinckrodt PLC shrugged off monetary claims brought by states in a sprawling generic drug antitrust enforcement action when the company emerged from bankruptcy in 2022.

  • February 24, 2026

    United Wants Partial Fraud Suit Win Against Billing Co.

    TeamHealth has been submitting fraudulent claims to get UnitedHealthcare to overpay it by more than $100 million, the insurer argued as it asked a Tennessee federal judge to grant it a partial early win in its suit against the emergency room staffing and billing company.

  • February 24, 2026

    Philips Unit Escapes CPAP Machine Whistleblower Case

    Philips Respironics, a unit of Koninklijke Philips NV, fended off a whistleblower suit alleging it provided kickbacks to CPAP suppliers that bought its products, with a Pennsylvania federal judge ruling that a former Philips manager failed to show that the company willfully engaged in illegal conduct.

  • February 24, 2026

    PE-Owned Doc Staffing Raises ER Fraud Risk

    As private equity firms scoop up physician staffing companies, healthcare litigators say emergency rooms and referrals are fertile ground for fraud and False Claims Act enforcement.

  • February 24, 2026

    AbbVie Tests Exclusion Strategy In Drug Price Fight

    Following a series of drugmaker losses in suits challenging Medicare drug price negotiations, AbbVie Inc. is trying something new in a challenge focused on Botox and a legal exclusion for drugs made from human plasma.

  • February 24, 2026

    AstraZeneca Drug Price Challenge Falls Short In Hawaii

    A federal judge in Hawaii temporarily upheld the state's law that prevents drug manufacturers from blocking safety-net hospitals from contracting with an unlimited number of outside pharmacies to dispense discounted prescription drugs under the 340B Drug Discount Program. 

  • February 24, 2026

    Mintz Lands IP Pro From Wilson Sonsini In San Francisco

    Mintz Levin Cohn Ferris Glovsky and Popeo PC. announced Tuesday that it has added a patent litigation attorney who was at Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati PC for more than two decades to bolster its intellectual property division.

  • February 23, 2026

    DC Circ. Talks Sharks, Moats In Vertex HHS Kickback Appeal

    Sharks and moats were top of mind Monday morning for one judge on the D.C. Circuit, as gene therapy drugmaker Vertex Pharmaceuticals attempted to convince the court that its fertility preservation program does not violate the Anti-Kickback Statute.

  • February 23, 2026

    Zynex Faces Securities Suit Following Arrest Of Former Execs

    After being arrested last month on charges of securities fraud and conspiracy, the former CEO and ex-chief compliance officer of bankrupt medical device maker Zynex have been hit with a securities class action that alleges they and others caused the company to engage in fraudulent billing practices that inflated its stock price and led to investor losses once the truth came to light.

  • February 23, 2026

    Ferguson Braswell Adds Healthcare Practice With 2 In Texas

    Ferguson Braswell Fraser Kubasta PC announced Monday that it has opened a healthcare practice with a pair of new shareholders in Houston, expanding the firm's corporate platform.

  • February 20, 2026

    DOJ Says Ohio Health System's Contracts Violate Antitrust

    The U.S. Department of Justice and Ohio's attorney general's office sued OhioHealth Corp. Friday in federal court, accusing the healthcare system of using contractual restrictions to block insurers from offering plans that include lower-cost rivals.

  • February 20, 2026

    Court OKs $376K Arb. Victory For Accountant In PWFA Suit

    A Texas federal court approved a $376,000 arbitration award for a former community center accounting employee who alleged she was belittled by a supervisor and denied telework as a temporary accommodation following childbirth.

  • February 20, 2026

    Kaiser Sues Insurers To Tap $95M D&O Policy For Fraud Deal

    Kaiser Foundation Health Plan sued Chubb and other insurers in California federal court Friday seeking to tap $95 million in directors and officers liability coverage for a recently settled whistleblower action that accused Kaiser of submitting false diagnoses for Medicare Advantage Plan enrollees. 

  • February 20, 2026

    Judge Says Texas Can't Enforce Optometry Anti-Steering Law

    A Texas federal judge on Friday blocked the state from enforcing an anti-steering law that banned managed care plans from telling insureds about optometrists who offer cheaper options, saying that the law violated protected commercial speech. 

  • February 20, 2026

    Lack Of Standing Dooms GardaWorld Health Fees Suit

    A North Carolina federal judge on Friday threw out a suit alleging that GardaWorld Cash Service violated federal employment law with surcharges on its employee health plan for those who use tobacco or refused COVID-19 vaccination after finding that the two named plaintiffs did not participate in the health plan.

  • February 19, 2026

    Judge Denies Mylan And Aurobindo's Bid To Escape Trial

    A Connecticut federal judge has once again rejected generic-drug makers' bid to escape a multistate lawsuit accusing them of engaging in an overarching antitrust conspiracy, saying the evidence supports the need for a jury trial on whether the companies colluded to fix prices and divvy up markets for dozens of generic drugs.

  • February 19, 2026

    Texas Suit Says Sanofi Paid Kickbacks For Prescriptions

    Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton sued Sanofi-Aventis US LLC in state court Thursday, accusing the pharmaceutical company of paying kickbacks to providers so they would prescribe Sanofi's drugs.

  • February 19, 2026

    Red State AGs Back La. Bid To Halt Eased Abortion Pill Rules

    A coalition of 21 Republican state attorneys general, led by Nebraska, urged a federal judge to grant Louisiana's bid to block the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's 2023 rules easing access to the abortion drug mifepristone, arguing that the policy undermines states' authority to enforce their own abortion laws and imposes a "pocketbook injury" on states.

  • February 19, 2026

    EEOC, Urology Co. Secure OK For Pregnancy Bias Settlement

    An Oklahoma federal judge signed off on a $90,000 deal on Thursday to end a U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission suit claiming a urology practice placed a pregnant employee on unpaid leave rather than allow her to sit on the job.

  • February 19, 2026

    Conn. Medical Office Faces 3 'Insomnia' Data Breach Suits

    A Connecticut medical practice failed to secure its patients' and employees' private information ahead of a ransomware attack that likely affected thousands of people, then flouted its duty to provide the victims with proper notice, according to three proposed class actions filed in the past week.

  • February 19, 2026

    Texas Panel Unsure Midwife Can Escape Abortion Order

    A Texas appellate court pushed back on a midwife's assertion that a court order blocking her from providing abortions flouted the state's rules of civil procedure, saying Thursday she wasn't facing the lawsuit "for doing appendectomies."

  • February 19, 2026

    Pharma Group Asks 1st Circ. To Ax RI's 340B Drug Price Law

    A pharmaceutical trade group has urged the First Circuit to overturn a district court's order siding with a Rhode Island law that bars drug manufacturers from blocking hospitals and clinics from contracting with outside pharmacies to dispense discounted drugs under the federal 340B Discount Drug Program. 

  • February 19, 2026

    Scientist Must Give Splenda Maker Emails With In-House Attys

    A scientist battling a lawsuit by the maker of Splenda over her research linking the artificial sweetener to cancer-causing chemicals must turn over emails with her employer's in-house counsel, a North Carolina magistrate judge ruled, finding they are not protected by privilege.

  • February 19, 2026

    Northwell Health Should Beat Pension Plan Suit, Judge Says

    Northwell Health inched closer to escaping a proposed class action alleging the hospital system hid cuts to workers' pension plans when converting to a cash-balance plan in the late 1990s, after a New York federal magistrate judge held disclosures about plan changes complied with federal benefits law.

  • February 19, 2026

    Harvard Docs Get Censored Articles Permanently Restored

    The Trump administration agreed to maintain the court-ordered restoration of articles penned by Harvard Medical School researchers that contained references to the LGBTQ+ community after they had previously been scrubbed from a government-hosted website.

Expert Analysis

  • Unpacking Ore. Law's Limits On PE Healthcare Investment

    Author Photo

    A recent Oregon law imposes significant restrictions on nonphysicians owning or controlling medical practices, but newly enacted amendments provide some additional flexibility in certain ownership arrangements without scuttling the law's intent of addressing concerns about the rise of private equity investment in healthcare, say attorneys at Debevoise.

  • Criminal Healthcare Fraud Takeaways From 4th Circ. Reversal

    Author Photo

    After the Fourth Circuit reversed a doctor’s postconviction acquittal in U.S. v. Elfenbein last month, defense attorneys should consider three strategies when handling complex criminal healthcare matters, says Jonathan Porter at Husch Blackwell.

  • AG Watch: Texas Embraces The MAHA Movement

    Author Photo

    Attorneys at Kelley Drye examine Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton's actions related to the federal Make America Healthy Again movement, and how these actions hinge on representations or omissions by the target companies as opposed to specific analyses of the potential health risks.

  • How States Are Regulating Health Insurers' AI Usage

    Author Photo

    The absence of a federal artificial intelligence framework positions states as key regulators of health insurers’ AI use, making it important for payors and service providers to understand the range of state AI legislation being passed in California and elsewhere, and consider implementing an AI-focused compliance infrastructure, say attorneys at Ropes & Gray.

  • HHS Plan To Cut Immigrant Benefits Spurs Provider Questions

    Author Photo

    A recent notice from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services identifying new federal public benefit programs for which nonqualified aliens are not eligible may have a major impact on entities that participate in these programs — but many questions remain unanswered, say attorneys at Foley.

  • Noncompete Forecast Shows Tough Weather For Employers

    Author Photo

    Several new state noncompete laws signal rough conditions for employers, particularly in the healthcare sector, so employers must account for employees' geographic circumstances as they cannot rely solely on choice-of-law clauses, say lawyers at McDermott.

  • Previewing State Efforts To Regulate Mental Health Chatbots

    Author Photo

    New York, Nevada and Utah have all recently enacted laws regulating the use of artificial intelligence to deliver mental health services, offering early insights into how other states may regulate this area, say attorneys at Goodwin.

  • How DOJ's New Data Security Rules Leave HIPAA In The Dust

    Author Photo

    The U.S. Department of Justice's recently effective data security requirements carry profound implications for how healthcare providers collect, store, share and use data — and approach vendor oversight — that go far beyond the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, say attorneys at Nelson Mullins.

  • Texas Med Spas Must Prepare For 2 New State Laws

    Author Photo

    Two new laws in Texas — regulating elective intravenous therapy and reforming healthcare noncompetes — mark a pivotal shift in the regulatory framework for medical spas in the state, which must proactively adapt their operations and contractual practices, says Brad Cook at Munsch Hardt.

  • DOJ-HHS Collab Crystallizes Focus On Health Enforcement

    Author Photo

    The recently announced partnership between the U.S. Department of Justice and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to combat False Claims Act violations, following a multiyear trend of high-dollar DOJ recoveries, signals a long-term enforcement horizon with major implications for healthcare entities and whistleblowers, say attorneys at RJO.

  • How The Healthline Privacy Settlement Redefines Ad Tech Use

    Author Photo

    The Healthline settlement is the first time California has drawn a clear line in the sand around how website tracking must function in practice, so if your site uses tracking technologies, especially around sensitive content like health or finance, regulators are inspecting your website's back end, not just its banner, say attorneys at Baker Donelson.

  • How Sweeping Budget Bill Shakes Up Health Industry

    Author Photo

    With the recently passed One Big Beautiful Bill Act marking one of the most significant overhauls of federal health policy since the passage of the Affordable Care Act, providers, managed care organizations and life sciences companies must now shift focus from policy review to implementation planning, say advisers at Holland & Knight.

  • New DOJ Penalty Policy Could Spell Trouble For Cos.

    Author Photo

    In light of the U.S. Department of Justice’s recently published guidance making victim relief a core condition of coordinated resolution crediting, companies facing parallel investigations must carefully calibrate their negotiation strategies to minimize the risk of duplicative penalties, say attorneys at Debevoise.