Policy & Compliance

  • 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.

  • February 18, 2026

    Blue Shield Of Calif. Says 'Ghost Network' Action Falls Flat

    Trouble finding a mental health care therapist is unfortunate but not something that an entire class action can be based on, argued Blue Shield of California, urging a federal judge to dismiss a suit accusing the company of maintaining a "ghost network" directory of providers who don't exist or don't accept new patients.

Expert Analysis

  • Remote Patient Monitoring Is At Regulatory Inflection Point

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    With remote patient monitoring at the center of new federal pilot programs and a recent report from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Office of Inspector General examining Medicare billing for those services, it is clear that balancing innovation and risk will be a central challenge ahead for digital health stakeholders, say attorneys at Morgan Lewis.

  • Utah's AI Prescription Renewal Pilot Could Inform Policy

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    Utah recently became the first state to approve an artificial intelligence system for autonomously renewing certain prescription medicines, providing a test case for how regulators may be able to draw boundaries between administrative automation and medical judgment, say Jashaswi Ghosh at Holon Law Partners and Bryant Godfrey at Foley Hoag.

  • Ramped Up Psychedelic Production Carries Opportunity, Risk

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    Kimberly Chew at Husch Blackwell discusses the key legal implications of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration's recent dramatic increases in the production quotas for a range of psychedelic substances, offering guidance on compliance, risk management and strategic opportunities for practitioners navigating this rapidly evolving landscape.

  • New Biotech Nat'l Security Controls May Have Blunted Impact

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    While the newly enacted federal prohibition against contracting with certain biotechnology providers associated with countries of concern may have consequences on U.S. companies' ability to develop drugs, the restrictions may prove to be less problematic for the industry than the significant publicity around their passage would suggest, say attorneys at Wilson Sonsini.

  • Takeaways From The DOJ Fraud Section's 2025 Year In Review

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    Former acting Principal Deputy Chief Sean Tonolli of the U.S. Department of Justice's Fraud Section, now at Cahill Gordon, analyzes key findings from the section’s annual report — including the changes implemented to adapt to the new administration’s priorities — and lays out what to watch for this year.

  • Traditional FCA Enforcement Surges Amid Shifting Priorities

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    The U.S. Department of Justice’s January report on False Claims Act enforcement in fiscal year 2025 reveals that while the administration signaled its intent to expand FCA enforcement into new areas such as tariffs, for now the greatest exposure remains in traditional areas like healthcare — in which the risk is growing, say attorneys at Debevoise.

  • 3 Key Ohio Financial Services Developments From 2025

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    Ohio's banking and financial services sector saw particularly notable developments in 2025, including a significant Ohio Supreme Court decision on creditor disclosure duties to guarantors in Huntington National Bank v. Schneider, and some major proposed changes to the state's Homebuyer Plus program, says Alex Durst at Durst Kerridge.

  • Rescheduling Cannabis Marks New Tax Era For Operators

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    As the attorney general takes steps to move cannabis from Schedule I to Schedule III of the Controlled Substances Act, operators and advisers should prepare by considering the significant changes this will bring from tax, state, industry and market perspectives, says Michael Harlow at CohnReznick.

  • Justices' Med Mal Ruling May Spur Huge Shift For Litigators

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    The U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision in the medical malpractice suit Berk v. Choy, holding that a Florida procedural requirement does not apply to medical malpractice claims filed in federal court, is likely to encourage eligible parties to file claims in federal court, speed the adjudicatory process and create both opportunities and challenges for litigators, says Thomas Kroeger at Colson Hicks.

  • 5 Drug Pricing Policy Developments To Watch In 2026

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    2026 may prove to be a critical year for drug pricing in the U.S., with potential major shifts including several legislative initiatives moving forward after being in the works for years, and more experimentation on the horizon concerning GLP-1s and Section 340B pricing, say attorneys at Manatt.

  • Regulatory Uncertainty Ahead For Organ Transplant System

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    Pending court cases against a Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services final rule that introduced a competition-centric model for assessing organ procurement organizations' performance will significantly influence the path forward for such organizations and transplant hospitals, say attorneys at Crowell & Moring.

  • Key False Claims Act Trends From The Last Year

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    The False Claims Act remains a powerful enforcement tool after some record verdicts and settlements in 2025, and while traditional fraud areas remain a priority, new initiatives are raising questions about its expanding application, says Veronica Nannis at Joseph Greenwald.

  • It's Too Soon To Remove Suicide Warnings From GLP-1 Drugs

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    The U.S. Food and Drug Administration's decision this month to order removal of warnings about the risk of suicidal thoughts from GLP-1 weight-loss drugs is premature — and from a safety and legal standpoint, the downside of acting too soon could be profound, says Sean Domnick at Rafferty Domnick.