Law Commons^™

Harmonizing The Affordable Care Act (Obama Care) With The Three Main National Systems For Healthcare Quality Improvement: The Tort, Licensure And Hospital Peer Review Systems, K Van Tassel

Katharine A. Van Tassel

According to an estimate by the Institute of Medicine made over a decade ago, treatment errors in hospitals alone caused 98,000 deaths yearly. This IOM report is proving to be very conservative. A recent Consumer Reports investigation came to the conclusion that “[m]ore than 2.25 million Americans will probably die from medical harm this decade…. That’s like wiping out the entire populations of North Dakota, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It’s a manmade disaster.”

One of the reasons for this astonishing mortality rate is the normative practice of custom-based medicine in the United States. A large and rapidly growing group of …

Stigma And The Emerging Law Of Obesity Control, Lindsay F. Wiley

Lindsay Wiley

Scholars have proposed a wide range of legal tools for fighting the obesity epidemic by altering the obesigenic environment: zoning regulations to create more physically active communities; taxes, bans and subsidies to create a healthier food marketplace; and disclosure requirements and advertising restrictions to alter the information environment. As policymakers take up the war on obesity, however, these promising environmental interventions are losing out to cheaper and more politically palatable interventions that target obese individuals in an effort to convince them to lose weight. For example, recent reforms have encouraged employers and insurance companies to penalize obese people through higher …

Agencies In Crisis?: An Examination Of State And Federal Agency Emergency Powers, Babette Boliek

Babette Boliek

That state and federal agencies have emergency powers, is well known. Much less is known about the process and circumstances under which these powers are exercised—subjects that divide scholars into two theoretical camps. Scholars on one side assert that ample agency discretion in time of need is not only desirable, but it is laudable in the pursuit of efficiency and “deossification” of regulatory action. Scholars on the other side contend that emergency powers are so broadly granted, and representative procedure is so easily abandoned, that the inevitable result is agency unaccountability and aggrandizement. In response, this article presents new empirical …

Patient Protection And Decision Aid Quality: Regulatory And Tort Law Approaches, Nadia N. Sawicki

Nadia N. Sawicki

One of the most enduring debates at the intersection of administrative and tort law focuses on the challenge of identifying the most effective means of ensuring consumer safety. In some circumstances, standard-setting administrative regulations may be sufficient to protect consumers from harm while at the same supporting the growth of valuable industries. In other circumstances, regulation may need to be supplemented by a complementary tort regime that fills the compensation gap when consumers suffer injury. The discussion among policymakers and legal scholars about which system to favor is continually playing out in a variety of arenas, most notably in the …

Opening Doors: Preventing Youth Homelessness Through Housing And Education Collaboration, Courtney L. Anderson

Courtney L Anderson

This article will contribute to the general literature on homelessness by recommending that permanent supportive housing units for homeless children, youth and families provide education services in order to prevent and end homelessness among families, youth and children. I will explain how the legal framework for such housing requires a broad interpretation of the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act, and assert that federal programs provide a foundation for the creation of such housing. Identifying and educating homeless youth is particularly challenging as the majority of homeless youth live on the streets or in the homes of others, suffer from serious mental …

"A Necessary Cost Of Freedom"? The Incoherence Of Sorrell V. Ims, Tamara R. Piety

Tamara R. Piety

On June 23, 2011 the Supreme Court announced its decision in a closely watched case, Sorrell v. IMS, striking down Vermont’s law prohibiting pharmacies from selling physicians’ prescription records without their permission for use in marketing brand name drugs. The Court’s majority struck down Vermont’s statute as unconstitutional on the grounds that the law was not “content neutral” because it singled out marketing for disparate treatment. It in effect applied a strict scrutiny test to a category of speech that has technically if not in practice been subject to intermediate scrutiny. This ruling effectively does away with the commercial speech …

Erisa Preemption Of Provider Reimbursement Litigation Post-Ppaca:Some Things (Unfortunately) Never Change, Mary Ann Chirba, Alice Noble

Mary Ann Chirba

No abstract provided.

Emerging Federal And International Guidelines For Stem Cell Research: Increased Funding Increases The Need For Consensus, Mary Ann Chirba

Mary Ann Chirba

No abstract provided.

The [Sur]Reality Of Mental Health Parity For Adolescent Psychiatric Disorders And Developmental Disabilities, Mary Ann Chirba

Mary Ann Chirba

No abstract provided.

The Vaccine Efficacy Standard: Ethical And Policy Concerns In Light Of Emerging Vaccines, Vincent Y. Ling

Vincent Y. Ling

An efficacy showing is one prerequisite for market approval of vaccines in the United States. The Food and Drug Administration’s current standard for efficacy, however, is low and vague, which allows partially effective vaccines on the market. The use of partially effective vaccines poses an ethical dilemma, especially when more effective vaccines are, or will be, available. Non-regulatory forces contribute to a higher efficacy showing in practice, but more instructive efficacy regulation will be necessary as partially effective vaccines become a viable health care option. A growing emphasis on comparative effectiveness research under the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (“PCORI”), established …