Articles and Blogs

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (“CMS”) recently adopted its Final Rule (the “Final Rule”) modifications to the Stark Law aimed at modernizing and clarifying various regulations. Two such changes are universally relevant, but particularly so for those who practice in the health care real estate realm. For an overview of all changes... READ MORE

On November 20, 2020, CMS issued its Final Rule (the “Final Rule”) modifying various Stark Law regulations, including those specifically geared toward real estate arrangements. For a general overview of the Final Rule, please see Hall Render’s alert on the subject and our overview webinars on December 1 and December 8. This alert provides... READ MORE

Many clients have inquired about what they can do to ensure adequate safety precautions are being observed in their medical office buildings. A recent study found that 61% of Americans are not confident or only slightly confident that public spaces have the guidance needed to open safely. Another study found that 44% of respondents... READ MORE

In the early morning of Thursday, August 27, 2020, Hurricane Laura made landfall along the southern coast of Louisiana and Mississippi as a Category 4 storm, causing significant property damage to commercial properties, including health care facilities. As nonprofit hospitals and health systems assess and fix the damage resulting from natural disasters like Hurricane... READ MORE

The health care real estate industry has not been immune to the COVID-19 pandemic as evidenced by a lower volume of medical office building sales in the second quarter of 2020. Even so, many current trends in health care real estate existed prior to the COVID-19 outbreak. The outbreak largely amplified, rather than created,... READ MORE

On July 8, 2020, the Department of Justice announced it settled a qui tam action[1] involving alleged violations of the federal and state False Claims Act (“FCA”) for $72.3 million against an Oklahoma surgical specialty hospital, its managers, a physician group and two individual physicians. Part of the factual allegations underpinning the FCA claims... READ MORE

In April 2020, Hall Render published an article detailing state statutory, administrative and common law directives guiding commercial eviction and foreclosure actions during the COVID-19 pandemic. Two months later, the pandemic has far from subsided with many states reporting rising rates of new cases and experts predicting a second wave sometime in the fall,... READ MORE

On September 6, 2019, OIG issued Advisory Opinion No. 19-05 (“the Opinion”) regarding the proposed purchase of real estate from an entity owned and managed, in part, by an excluded individual. The facts that gave rise to the Opinion involved a community health center receiving federal grant funding and Medicare reimbursement which was looking... READ MORE

As more hospitals and hospital systems merge and consolidate, as well as focus their time and attention on providing more outpatient care, recent market trends suggest adaptive reuse projects will become increasingly relevant to health care providers. As a follow-up to a recent Hall Render article defining “adaptive reuse” and outlining the incentives and challenges... READ MORE

For nearly 30 years, Palm Valley Cinema provided the community of Goodyear, Arizona with the biggest, newest Hollywood movie releases, from Saving Private Ryan to Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, until it closed in 2016. However, new plans for the cinema will be focused on saving patients rather than providing a source of... READ MORE