Law Commons^™

The Patient's Voice: Legal Implications Of Patient-Reported Outcome Measures, Sharona Hoffman, Andy Podgurski

Faculty Publications

In recent years, the medical community has paid increasing attention to patients' own assessments of their health status. Even regulatory agencies, such as the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, are now interested in patient self-reports. The legal implications of this shift, however, have received little attention. This Article begins to fill that gap. It introduces to the legal literature a discussion that has been ongoing in the health care field.

Patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs) are reports of patients’ symptoms, treatment outcomes, and health status that are documented directly by patients, typically through electronic …

Modernizing The Emergency Medical Treatment & Labor Act To Harmonize With The Affordable Care Act To Improve Equality, Quality And Cost Of Emergency Care, Katharine A. Van Tassel

Faculty Publications

The Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act (EMTALA) is a federal statute passed almost 30 years ago which was designed to ensure equal access to emergency treatment and to halt the practice of “patient dumping.” Patient dumping is a situation where some patients—typically uninsured, disabled, and minority individuals—receive inferior emergency medical care or are denied emergency medical treatment altogether. The goal of EMTALA is to ensure that everyone coming to the emergency room will receive equal care.

Unfortunately, despite EMTALA, the practice of patient dumping has continued to this day. The most recent case in the news is the …

E-Health Hazards: Provider Liability And Electronic Health Record Systems, Sharona Hoffman, Andy Podgurski

Faculty Publications

In the foreseeable future, electronic health record (EHR) systems are likely to become a fixture in medical settings. The potential benefits of computerization could be substantial, but EHR systems also give rise to new liability risks for health care providers that have received little attention in the legal literature. This Article features a first of its kind, comprehensive analysis of the liability risks associated with use of this complex and important technology. In addition, it develops recommendations to address these liability concerns. Appropriate measures include federal regulations designed to ensure the quality and safety of EHR systems along with agency …