Friday, November 29, 2024

Two New Enforcement Actions from Texas Attorney General

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As easy as it is to dislike Ken Paxton for his extravagantly disruptive policies on abortion and gender-affirming care for minors, his offic...

U.K. Moves Toward Medical Assistance in Dying/Assisted Suicide

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A bill to legalize physician-assisted suicide passed in the House of Commons today. In the U.S., where 10 states and D.C. have legalized P...
Monday, November 18, 2024

West Virginia's Constitutional Amendment Prohibiting Physician-Assisted Suicide

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Prof. Austin Sarat ( Amherst College ) has posted an excellent op-ed on the website of The Hill that describes and decries the autonomy-c...
Thursday, November 14, 2024

Health Affairs: "The Impact Of The Election On Health Policy And The Courts"

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The nonpartisan and highly respected journal, Health Affairs , today posted an analysis of some of the more conspicuous (and worrying) chan...
Friday, November 08, 2024

Hospital Price Transparency Rule & No Surprises Act: Two Updates (One Surprising, the Other Not So Much)

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I. HHS OIG Report -- Disappointing But Not So Surprising "Not All Selected Hospitals Complied With the Hospital Price Transparency Rule...

Texas Tax-Exempt Hospitals & Charity Care: Surprisingly Progressive

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In 1985 -- one year before Congress added EMTALA to Medicare's Conditions of Participation -- Texas became the first state in the countr...
Thursday, November 07, 2024

Tax-Exempt Hospitals & Charity Care: A Mixed Bag

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Health Affairs  just published (and re-published) a few articles on this topic. Their titles pretty much tell the whole story (but here are ...
Wednesday, November 06, 2024

Washington Physicians Seek Supreme Court Injunction, Claiming 1st Amendment Right to Spread Vax Misinformation

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Three physicians licensed in Washington State have disciplinary proceedings pending against them based upon their unfounded public statement...
Tuesday, November 05, 2024

SCOTUS Oral Argument Today

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Just a quick addendum to my Friday listing of healthcare-related cases on the current SCOTUS docket. This morning the Justices heard oral ...
Monday, November 04, 2024

SCOTUS Watch Update: Oral Arguments for the Coming Week

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The Court will hear arguments in two important health-law-related case this week: Monday, 12/2: E-cigarettes and the FDA. The Court will con...
Saturday, November 02, 2024

Reprise: Does EMTALA Pre-Empt Restrictive State Abortion Laws?

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Back in June I discussed the applicability of the federal Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act to pregnant persons who come to hospita...
Friday, November 01, 2024

SCOTUS Update: Health-Related Cases on the Docket for the October 2024 Term

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Here are a handful of cases of potential significance (case name links to SCOTUSBlog ; case numbers link to Supreme Court's docket ): Fi...
Thursday, October 31, 2024

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From The Commonwealth Fund announcement about its report, "Comparing Deaths from Gun Violence in the U.S. with Other Countries" (...
Wednesday, October 30, 2024

More on Health Care and the Election

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Yesterday I posted Drew Altman's view of the health care issues that are most likely to be affected by the outcome of next Tuesday's...

KFF's CEO: Final Thoughts on Health Care and the Election

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Drew Altman heads the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation , a reliable source of health care data and analysis. His "Quick Take" ...

Toddler's Snake Bite Costs $290K+ to Treat

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Two-year-old Brigland Pfeffer was playing with his sibs in their San Diego backyard when he was bitten by a rattlesnake. Ouch!  His was one ...
Friday, October 25, 2024

"Climate change is the most significant threat to human health in the 21st century"

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That's the bottom line from Admiral Rachel L. Levine, M.D. , the U.S. Assistant Secretary for Health. She's the guest on a podcast ...
Monday, October 21, 2024

Texas AG Sues Pediatrician for Providing Gender-Affirming Treatment

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Last week Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton sued Dr. May Lau, a Dallas pediatrician and assistant professor at UT-Southwestern Medical Schoo...