Healthcare Law Briefs
1.
Revocation of Surgical Privileges Does Not Constitute Age Discrimination
The Sixth Circuit rejected a surgeon's
claim that revocation of clinical privileges constituted age
discrimination because membership on the medical staff did not entitle
the physician to employment based discrimination protections. (Shah v.
Deaconess Hospital, 6th. Cir. No. 02-3033, 1/14/04)
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2.
Malpractice Study Finds Premiums Lower in States With Damage Caps
A study published in the January issue of
the health policy journal, Health Affairs, concludes that
premiums are about 17% lower in the 24 states with some form of damage
caps, although it also concludes that the absence of caps does not fully
explain premium differences.
http://www.healthaffairs.org.
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3. CMS
Publishes National Provider Identifier Number Regulations
On January 23, 2004, CMS issued the final
rule for the establishment of a national identification number system,
to be administered by the National Provider System, to assign unique
National Provider Identifiers (NPIs) to all health care providers, which
must then be used by health plans and employers to process healthcare
transactions. Providers may begin applying for NPIs no earlier than
5/23/05 and must have an NPI to use for all covered healthcare
transactions with health plans and clearinghouses by 5/23/07. Small
health plans have one additional year for compliance, i.e. 5/23/08.
National Provider System (NPS) is the
name of the system to be managed by HHS, similar to the National
Practitioner Data Bank (NPDB). The system is the culmination of a study
initiated in 1993 by CMS (then the Health Care Financing Administration
- HCFA) and then mandated by Congress in the Administrative
Simplification provisions of HIPAA in 1996. The NPI will be a ten
character numeric identifier meeting the national standards for
healthcare transactions by the Workgroup for Electronic Data Interchange
(WEDI) and the American National Standards Institute (ANSI).
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4.
Mcare
Abatement Application Deadline
The deadline for filing applications for
abatement of the 2003 Mcare assessment is postmarked by February
12, 2004 or received by February 15, 2004, plus the prior online
submission. For information:
http://ww.mcare.state.pc.us.
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5. Attorney Michael A. Cassidy Publishes Credentialing
Article in the AHLA Health Lawyers News
Mike Cassidy published "Confidentiality of Peer
Review Records: Fact Or Fiction?" in the American Health Lawyers
Association's January 2004 Health Lawyers News.
To read the article, please click here.
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>For more information about the
topics presented in this newsletter please contact one of the
Healthcare
Attorneys:
Read
the December 2003 issue of our HEALTHCARE
NEWSLETTER.
 Tucker Arensberg,
P.C.
1500 One PPG
Place Pittsburgh, PA 15222 412/566-1212
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