Health Law Advisor

Epstein Becker Green is pleased to announce the availability of a Wage and Hour Division Investigation Checklist, which provides health care and life sciences employers with valuable information about wage and hour investigations and audits conducted by the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL).  Like EBG’s first-of-its kind Wage and Hour App, which provides detailed information about federal and state laws, the Checklist is a free resource offered by EBG.

The Checklist provides step-by-step guidance on the following issues: preparation before a Wage and Hour Division ...

by: Adam C. Abrahms, Kara M. Maciel, Evan J. Spelfogel and Steven M. Swirsky

In a time when employers do not receive much good news out of Washington D.C., the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit may have given some very welcome relief to employers facing issues before the National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB” or “the Board”) in light of recent precedent reversing NLRB decisions.  Quoting from early Constitutional authority including The Federalist Papers and Marbury v. Madison, the D.C. Circuit ruled today that President Obama’s “Recess Appointments” of three ...

Our colleagues Mark E. Lutes, Robert J. Hudock, and Patricia M. Wagner have issued an alert on modifications to the HIPAA privacy, security, and enforcement rules. Following is an excerpt:

On January 17, 2013, the Department of Health and Human Services released the highly anticipated, 563 page, Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (“HIPAA”) regulations (the “Final Rule”) that have been delayed for over 3 years. The Final Rule will be published in the Federal Register on January 25, 2013. The Final Rule addresses many of the compliance issues and ...

By Greta Ravitsky

I wrote the January 2013 edition of Take 5: Views You Can Use, a newsletter published by the Labor and Employment practice of Epstein Becker Green.

In it, I summarize five actions that employers should consider taking in 2013 as the DOL steps up its audit efforts under the leadership of the reenergized Obama administration:

1. Assess the Workforce
2. Choose Whether to “Pay” or to “Play”
3. Evaluate Existing Wellness Programs and/or Implement New Wellness Programs to Enhance Employees’ Health Profiles and to Avoid or Minimize the “Cadillac Tax”
4. Understand and ...

By Greta Ravitsky

I wrote the January 2013 edition of Take 5: Views You Can Use, a newsletter published by the Labor and Employment practice of Epstein Becker Green.

In it, I summarize  five actions that employers should consider taking in 2013 as the DOL steps up its audit efforts under the leadership of the reenergized Obama administration,

1. Assess the Workforce
2. Choose Whether to “Pay” or to “Play”
3. Evaluate Existing Wellness Programs and/or Implement New Wellness Programs to Enhance Employees’ Health Profiles and to Avoid  or Minimize the “Cadillac ...

It is no secret that the National Labor Relations Board (the “Board”) is engaged in a purposeful and partisan attempt to issue rules and decisions that benefit unions, often to the detriment of employers, including attempts by the Board to assert itself into non-union workplaces.    The decisions that the Board has issued over the past few weeks illustrate that this trend is likely to continue during President Obama’s second term.  Indeed, the holiday season has provided unions with additional reason to celebrate as, among other things, the Board has overturned decades of ...

Epstein Becker Green is pleased to announce a webinar series for health care employers focusing on new and more aggressive tactics and strategies being employed by health care industry unions.

This three-part webinar series will provide an in-depth analysis and offer tools to assist employers who currently have union represented workforces as well as those who are or may be facing organizing efforts.

Part I - January 29, 2013
Aggressive Union Organizing Strategies:  When Organizing Trumps Patient Care

Part II - February 28, 2013
Aggressive Union Negotiating Tactics

Part III - March ...

by: Maxine H. Neuhauser and Amy E. Hatcher

On January 7, 2013, the New Jersey Department of Labor and Workforce Development (the “Department”) published in the New Jersey Register proposed new rules and notification language to implement a recently enacted law intended to fight gender inequity and bias in the workplace.  The notice of proposal is available for downloading here.

The law, which became effective on November 19, 2012, requires every employer in New Jersey with 50 or more employees to post a notice advising employees of their right to be free from gender inequity or bias ...

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) Privacy Rule provides standards for the use and disclosure of "individually identifiable health information," dubbed protected health information, or PHI.  PHI is information, including demographic information, that relates to an individual's physical or mental health, the provision of health care to the individual, or payment for the provision of health care to the individual.  Such information constitutes PHI if it identifies the individual or if there is a reasonable basis to believe it can be ...

The rapid development and utilization of remote patient monitoring tools in health care exposes the limitations of state licensure laws that generally require physicians to be licensed in states where their patients are located.  These laws are predicated on the physician and patient being in the same jurisdiction.  However, when using mobile-devices to actively monitor patients (such as a device sensor with 4G chipset that can directly connect to cellular networks), there is no single geographic anchor or fixed moment in time from which to define the encounter, episode or point of ...