Hospitals, health systems, physician, and specialty groups are represented by Schwabe.
Overview
Our industry-focused team spots trends, tracks new technologies, and monitors changing regulations to help providers and entrepreneurs make decisions that are good for patients and good for business.
We focus on what is necessary to strengthen and grow your operations, including regulatory and compliance, entity formation and consolidation, transactions, digital transformation, employment disputes and investigations, privacy breaches, peer review proceedings, professional licensing board inquiries, accreditation, and medical malpractice claims.
We advise clients, from established health systems to technology companies revolutionizing healthcare delivery, on a wide range of legal matters, including advice on staffing and employment challenges; ways to decipher new privacy laws; how purchasing a medical building differs from buying an office building; or which tax strategies could unwittingly jeopardize accreditation. Schwabe’s industry team navigates the law on your behalf.
Attending to the business of healthcare
- We provide advice on labor and employment, fraud and abuse, the Stark Law and Anti-Kickback Statute, Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) and other data privacy and security laws, Medicare and Medicaid, and the Affordable Care Act.
- Cybersecurity and data breaches present a major challenge for healthcare providers. Our resources dig deeper than a compliance consultant’s checklist, providing analysis, not just process.
- Virtual healthcare and telemedicine arrived in a big way, and we can help you navigate their many challenges.
- We assist clients in their business transactions and help resolve issues that arise in employment, tax, corporate governance, real estate, litigation, intellectual property, and more.
Relieving the compliance burden
Regulatory compliance is increasing in complexity – and healthcare entities are subject to changing requirements. We focus on helping our clients’ organizations comply with current regulatory requirements, and defend those clients should inquiries or an investigation arise.
We help prevent regulatory problems by providing training sessions, reviewing policies and forms, and crafting responses to agency inquiries.
Billing practices are also subject to complex regulatory standards and plan requirements. Reimbursement rules from Medicare, Medicaid, insurers, and other payors continually shift. Our experience structuring and negotiating agreements and preventative programs helps providers minimize reimbursement problems.
Helping clients navigate healthcare M&A
Our depth in healthcare M&A and collaborations helps us spot potential pitfalls and find solutions to the unique business issues physicians, venture capitalists, and other owners and investors face.
Nonprofit and for-profit healthcare clients include:
- Hospital and health systems
- Physicians, medical groups, and advance practice providers
- Dentists and dental offices
- Ambulatory surgery centers
- Community care providers
- Long-term care providers
- Health plans and managed care plans
- Specialty insurers
- Health tech companies
- Diagnostic imaging practices
- Radiation oncology practices
industry relationships
American Health Lawyers Association
State of Healthcare in the PNW
Few other industries have faced the number of challenges that healthcare has over the past several years. We examine the experiences and concerns of healthcare executives, employees, and patients.
Experience
- Represent hospitals and specialty medical groups in joint ventures, both for-profit and charitable, and physician-hospital organization (PHO) formations.
- Advise on acquisition of physician practices, physician recruitment and employment, and compliance with the Stark and Anti-Kickback laws and the Internal Revenue Code.
- Provide HIPAA compliance advice and data breach coaching.
- Help investigate and respond to complaints filed against healthcare entities and practitioners by patients, staff members, and others.
- Review contracts, policies, and other documents to ensure favorable business terms and compliance with applicable laws and regulations.
- Advise hospitals and physicians on the revision of medical staff bylaws, medical staff peer review, the conduct of medical staff fair hearings, and reports to the National Practitioner Data Bank.
- Conduct investigations to assist health systems, hospitals, and other healthcare entities address possible compliance, employment, risk management, and other matters.
- Provide trainings and training materials on various healthcare and employment laws and regulations.
- Created Oregon’s first Accountable Care Organization (ACO) qualified for participation in the Medicare Shared Savings Program.
- Serve on and provide advice and counsel to the ethics committees of various healthcare entities.
- Provide interim or backup general counsel, compliance officer, privacy officer, security officer, or risk manager services to health systems and other entities.
- Draft and review contracts for electronic medical records systems and the sharing of software, services, and data between various healthcare entities.
- Draft policies and applications for insurance clients, including Affordable Care Act “Qualified Health Plans,” and life settlement contracts.
- Assist physicians and other healthcare professionals with licensing and credentialing matters, including investigations by licensing boards and credentialing committees.
- Assist healthcare entities and practitioners with negotiating, enforcing, and understanding their rights and responsibilities with respect to restrictive covenants.
- Obtained nonimmigrant visas and permanent residence status for key physicians and researchers for a major medical university.
- Draft consent forms, notices of privacy practices, conditions of registration forms, policies, and other documents needed by physician practices to operate in compliance with applicable laws and regulations and mitigate risks.
Sign up