Digital Health & Technology
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May 31, 2024
Samsung Strikes First With Smart Ring IP Suit Against Oura
Samsung has yet to announce a release date for its new Galaxy Ring brand of wearable, health-tracking devices, but it has filed an intellectual property suit in California federal court Thursday targeting a Finnish startup that makes its own line of smart rings.
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May 30, 2024
FTC, SEC Urged To Probe UnitedHealth's 'Negligent' Security
The chair of the U.S. Senate finance committee on Thursday pressed the Federal Trade Commission and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to hold UnitedHealth Group and its top executives liable for "numerous" cybersecurity failings that fueled a debilitating cyberattack on its Change Healthcare unit.
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May 30, 2024
Veradigm Execs Sued Over Company's Nasdaq Delisting
Current and former members of healthcare technology company Veradigm Inc.'s top brass were sued in Illinois federal court by shareholders alleging that the company suffered stock drops following a string of financial reporting blunders starting in 2021, which caused it to overstate roughly $40 million in revenue before facing a delisting notice from Nasdaq.
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May 29, 2024
Greenberg Traurig Adds IP Atty From Eversheds Sutherland
Greenberg Traurig LLP has bolstered its California bench of attorneys with an Eversheds Sutherland lawyer who has years of experience advising digital health and medical device companies on intellectual property issues.
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May 28, 2024
Pharmacy Benefits Co. Taps Health Atty To Lead Legal Team
RxBenefits, a company focused on generating savings for employers providing pharmacy benefits, has appointed a new chief legal officer to oversee its legal and regulatory compliance efforts.
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May 24, 2024
Fla. Lab Owner Will Pay $27M To End False Billing Suit
A Florida medical lab owner who pled guilty to charges related to accusations he billed Medicare for $53 million in unnecessary genetic cancer screening tests has agreed to pay more than $27 million to resolve three whistleblower suits over the same conduct, according to an announcement Friday from the U.S. Department of Justice.
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May 23, 2024
Stryker Unit And Seyfarth Attys Hit With $275K Sanctions
A Colorado federal judge has imposed $275,000 in sanctions jointly and severally on Stryker-owned Howmedica Osteonics Corp., along with Seyfarth Shaw LLP, for witness coaching and discovery violations in a bitter breach-of-contract dispute, amounting to roughly one-eighth of what plaintiff ORP Surgical LLC had sought.
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May 22, 2024
Stryker Agrees To Settle Calif. Misclassification Suit
Medical device company Stryker told a California federal court Wednesday it has agreed to settle a proposed class action accusing it of misclassifying workers as overtime-exempt and failing to pay them overtime during their mandatory training.
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May 22, 2024
Lead Blood Test Maker To Plead Guilty, Pay $42M Over Defects
Medical device maker Magellan Diagnostics has agreed to pay at least $42 million and plead guilty to hiding a defect in its blood testing devices for lead that caused inaccurately low results for tens of thousands of children and others, Massachusetts federal prosecutors said.
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May 21, 2024
Amid Abortion Suit, Ind. Officials Spar Over Report Releases
Indiana's top lawyer is set to respond to a lawsuit seeking access to doctor-created abortion reports. The case promises to highlight a rift between the state's vocally anti-abortion attorney general and other officials who say the information is off-limits to public records requests.
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May 21, 2024
Strategic Hiring Was The New Normal For BigLaw In 2023
The 400 largest law firms by headcount in the U.S. grew more slowly in 2023 than in the previous two years, while Kirkland & Ellis LLP surpassed the 3,000-attorney threshold, according to the latest Law360 ranking.
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May 21, 2024
The Law360 400: Tracking The Largest US Law Firms
The legal market expanded more tentatively in 2023 than in previous years amid a slowdown in demand for legal services, especially in transactions, an area that has been sluggish but is expected to quicken in the near future.
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May 17, 2024
FCA Relators Seek Finders Fee For SpineFrontier Doc Deals
Three whistleblowers who tipped off the federal government to a medical device company's multimillion-dollar kickback scheme said Friday the Justice Department is refusing to pay them a cut of the $3 million in False Claims Act settlements paid by surgeons who admitted participating in the sham consulting ploy.
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May 17, 2024
Ga. OB-GYN Office Says Data Breach Class Action Falls Flat
An Atlanta OB-GYN practice has urged a Georgia federal judge to dismiss a proposed class suit over a data breach that allegedly impacted the personal and protected health information of tens of thousands of patients, arguing the lead plaintiff has failed to meet the requirements of the Class Action Fairness Act.
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May 15, 2024
Blackbaud Dodges Data Breach Victims' Class Cert. Bid
A South Carolina federal judge has refused to certify several proposed classes consisting of roughly 1.5 billion patients, donors and other individuals whose personal information was allegedly swept up in a 2020 ransomware attack on software provider Blackbaud Inc., finding that the plaintiffs had failed to show that class members could be easily identified.
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May 15, 2024
UnitedHealth Concealed DOJ Merger Investigation, Suit Says
UnitedHealth Group has been hit with a proposed shareholder class action alleging that it failed to disclose that the U.S. Department of Justice had reopened an antitrust investigation into the health insurance giant following its acquisition of a healthcare data company, and that top executives had sold more than $120 million of shares knowing about the investigation before a news report revealed it to the public.
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May 14, 2024
Under Fire For Lab Rule, FDA Remains Open To Lawmaking
After a difficult run-up to a new federal rule on lab-developed tests, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration official overseeing medical devices voiced support Tuesday for additional lawmaking.
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May 13, 2024
Wash. Hospital Scores Exit In Facebook Privacy Suit, For Now
A Washington federal judge has tossed a proposed class action accusing a Seattle-area hospital of sharing patients' confidential health information by using Facebook browser tracking tools, ruling on Monday the plaintiff has failed to show that her own private information was input into the website and shared with a third party.
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May 13, 2024
Philips Wants Cleaner Co. To Chip In For $1B CPAP Deal
Koninklijke Philips NV has filed a third-party complaint in Pennsylvania federal court against SoClean Inc., which sells cleaning products for breathing devices, claiming SoClean and its parent should contribute to Philips' $1 billion settlement because its cleaners allegedly exacerbated the foam breakdown at the heart of the litigation.
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May 10, 2024
Retail Group Opposes $1B Arbitral Award Against Walgreens
An advocacy group for the retail industry is backing Walgreens as it looks to set aside a nearly $1 billion arbitral award in a dispute with a COVID test maker, telling a Delaware federal judge that judicial intervention is warranted in this case.
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May 10, 2024
No 'Piecemeal' Fees For Infant Data Win Amid 6th Circ. Appeal
A federal judge said Friday that he wouldn't award attorney fees to children who challenged Michigan's handling of blood samples collected in an infant health screening program until the state's Sixth Circuit appeal is resolved.
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May 08, 2024
Fla. Lab Owner Gets 10 Years For Unneeded Medical Tests
A Florida medical lab owner has been sentenced to 10 years in prison after pleading guilty to charges related to accusations that he billed Medicare for $53 million in unnecessary genetic cancer screening tests.
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May 07, 2024
MultiPlan, Insurance Cos. Accused Of Algorithmic Collusion
A medical provider has lodged a proposed class action in Illinois federal court accusing MultiPlan and major insurance companies, including UnitedHealth, Aetna, Kaiser Permanente and Cigna, of using pricing tools to systematically underpay out-of-network providers.
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May 07, 2024
New FDA Device Rule No Cure For Unregulated Lab Tests
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration's newly claimed authority over lab-developed tests will leave untold numbers of unregulated — and in some cases, inaccurate or otherwise faulty — tests in the hands of clinicians.
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May 06, 2024
Hooper Lundy Adds Government Relations Director
An attorney who worked in-house for healthcare industry trade and advocacy associations has joined healthcare boutique Hooper Lundy & Bookman PC as director of government relations and public policy.
Expert Analysis
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Wash. Class Actions Are Coming After My Health My Data Act
With its expansive scope and private right of action — including possible class actions — for damages, Washington state’s recently enacted My Health My Data Act will be the basis for a great deal of litigation, and companies should be mindful that plaintiffs will need to prove actual, monetary harm, says Tom Nolan at Quinn Emanuel.
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SEC Cybersecurity Rule Presents Burden For Health Care Cos.
A new rule from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission aims to increase cybersecurity resiliency, but may only force regulated entities — particularly those in the health care space — to face a far more complicated environment with increased strategic and litigation risks, say Bess Hinson and Angad Chopra at Holland & Knight.
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Comparing US And EU Approaches To Health AI Regulation
Victoria Larson and Julia Cotney at Verrill Dana compare current U.S. and EU regulatory frameworks for artificial intelligence and machine learning in the healthcare industry and highlight key principles that providers and developers should be aware of.
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Why Privacy And Trade Secret Law Are On A Collision Course
The conflict between the legal regimes of trade secret law and data privacy law is growing as companies increasingly collect and use data about their customers, making it key for organizations to find ways to comply with both laws in order to protect their intellectual property and the privacy of their customer, says Jenny Colgate at Rothwell Figg.
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Negotiating AI-Life Sciences Partnerships To Minimize IP Risk
When life sciences companies and AI companies form partnerships to foster innovation, the parties should align interests as well as mitigate intellectual property risks by strategically identifying and addressing the unique AI-related legal issues, such as training data, AI model and output, say attorneys at Finnegan.
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Parsing Through The FTC's Proposed Health Privacy Updates
The Federal Trade Commission's recently proposed updates to its Health Breach Notification Rule contain subtle but significant changes to key terms that help modernize the agency's health app regulation and provide stakeholders an important opportunity to help shape the future of virtual health care, say attorneys at Arnold & Porter.
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Regulating AI: An Overview Of Federal Efforts
The U.S. has been carefully managing a national policy and regulatory ecosystem toward artificial intelligence, but as AI technology continues to expand into our everyday lives, so too has its risks and the need for regulation, says Jennifer Maisel at Rothwell Figg.
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Compliance Takeaways From HHS Information Blocking Rule
A recently finalized rule from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Office of Inspector General demonstrates a renewed focus on investigating practices that may interfere with patients' access to their electronic health information, and should encourage renewed compliance efforts across a range of processes, say attorneys at Ropes & Gray.
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Life Sci Cos. Should Work With FDA To Shape AI Regulation
Due to the rapidly evolving nature of potentially long-term regulatory paradigms for artificial intelligence, drug and biologic manufacturers looking to leverage AI should engage strategically with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to ensure clarity surrounding compliance obligations, say Lowell Zeta and Blake Wilson at Hogan Lovells.
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BIPA, Meta Pixel Suits Could Reshape Cybersecurity Litigation
Businesses and attorneys should watch several pending electronic privacy cases that revolve around disclosure of protected personal information and health data, which may shape how courts handle damages and class actions in the future of cybersecurity litigation, say Kelly Johnson and Melanie Condon at Goldberg Segalla.
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The Double-Edged Sword Of Using ChatGPT In Health Care
While ChatGPT has shown promising potential in health care, one of the key challenges for players in this space is balancing patient privacy and data protection with the benefits of utilizing this technology, say attorneys at Sheppard Mullin.
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Addressing Legal Issues Raised By AI Use In Health Care
Excerpt from Practical Guidance
With the usage of artificial intelligence and machine learning in health care likely to be governed by a patchwork of state laws for the near future, industry actors should build flexibility into products to meet evolving regulatory concerns, including monetization of patient data and professional licensing questions, say Sara Shanti and Phil Kim at Sheppard Mullin.
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New Health Data Compliance Considerations For Pa. Lawyers
Given the regularity with which attorneys handle private health information, it is important for Pennsylvania firms to understand recent significant amendments to the state's data breach law, which address information not currently covered by federal law, says Mark Mattioli at Post & Schell.