Articles and Blogs

On December 2, 2020, CMS released final regulations (“Final Rule”) that permit increased expansion opportunities for certain physician-owned hospitals (“POHs”). CMS’s goal with these modifications was to remove unnecessary regulatory restrictions on high Medicaid physician-owned facilities. Background Under the Affordable Care Act’s amendments to the Stark Law, a POH cannot expand the aggregate number... READ MORE

On May 17, Sen. James Lankford (R-OK) introduced companion legislation (S. 1133) to the House bill that would repeal the Affordable Care Act’s (“ACA”) moratorium on physician-owned hospitals. Named the Patient Access to Higher Quality Health Care Act of 2017, the bill is the Senate’s version of legislation (H.R. 1156) previously introduced in the... READ MORE

On October 30, 2015, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (“CMS”) released the CY 2016 final rule for revisions to Payment Policies under the Physician Fee Schedule (“Final Rule”) following the proposed rule published in July 2015 (“Proposed Rule”).1  Among other Stark Law revisions, the Final Rule updates the Stark Law regulations for... READ MORE

On October 12, 2015, three Texas hospitals filed suit against the Department of Health and Human Services (“HHS”), the Secretary of HHS (“Secretary”) and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (“CMS”) seeking to reverse CMS’s decision to grant the request of a Texas physician-owned hospital (“POH”) to expand the hospital’s current facility by... READ MORE

According to a recent study by the British Medical Journal (“BMJ”) titled Access, Quality, and Costs of Care at Physician Owned Hospitals in the United States: Observational Study (“Study”), physician-owned hospitals (“POHs”) generally do not treat a higher volume of the most profitable patients (commonly referred to as “cherry-picking”) than other hospitals1.  The Study... READ MORE

Background On August 13, 2015, the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General (“OIG”) issued a Memorandum Report (the “Report”) that examined the overlap between physician-owned hospitals (“POHs”) and physician-owned distributors (“PODs”) of spinal devices. PODs are medical device distributors whose owners are often physicians that use the devices sold by... READ MORE

Executive Summary On July 8, 2015, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (“CMS”) published a proposed rule addressing many potential modifications to the Stark Law (“Proposed Rule”),1 as well as separate guidance for physician-owned hospitals relating to the required Annual Ownership/Investment Report (“Reporting Guidance”).2  The Proposed Rule, if implemented as currently proposed, would update... READ MORE

On May 19, 2015, the Subcommittee on Health of the House of Representatives Committee on Ways and Means, chaired by Kevin Brady (R-TX), held a hearing titled Improving Competition in Medicare: Removing Moratoria and Expanding Access. The hearing was the first in a series for the summer that is intended to identify solutions to... READ MORE

On March 4, 2015, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (“CMS”) announced a voluntary Self-Referral Disclosure Protocol (“SRDP”) that will allow physician-owned hospitals and rural providers an alternative way to remedy certain issues of noncompliance with the federal Stark Law (“Stark Law”).1  CMS has provided special instructions regarding a voluntary SRDP for physician-owned hospitals... READ MORE

In November 2014, the ECRI Institute¹ issued a report discussing issues of patient safety and adverse events linked to health information technology (“IT”) products. The report comes in the form of an annual list of top ten health technology safety hazards. According to the ECRI Institute, although many facets of health IT have a... READ MORE