Health Law and Policy Commons^™

Inconceivable? Deducting The Costs Of Fertility Treatment, Katherine Pratt

ExpressO

No abstract provided.

Biological Factors Associated With Aggression And Violent Behavior: A Comparative Analysis Of Scientific, Societal, And Legal Dimensions, Troy M. Bear

ExpressO

No abstract provided.

A Family Affair: Sharing Information About Genetic Diseases, Lyria K. Bennett Moses

ExpressO

Genetic test results provide information relevant to the future health of the person tested as well as parents, siblings, children and more distant relatives. This Article examines the legal consequences that might follow a decision to share or withhold genetic information. It argues that the obstacles to liability might not be justified in situations where either disclosure of genetic information or silence will cause significant harm.

Following The Man On The Clapham Omnibus: Social Science Evidence In Malpractice Litigation, Richard O. Lempert

Law & Economics Working Papers Archive: 2003-2009

This article responds to proposals to admit statistical evidence from empirical studies of actual health care practices to prove prevailing health practice standards in malpractice litigation by arguing that the case for doing so has numerous weaknesses that advocates of admitting such data commonly ignore. A fundamental concern is that the standard of practice defense co-evolved with prevailing modes of proof and might have been different had proof through experts not allowed for an aspirational as well as an empirical element to reach the jury. The article also argues that generating reliable statistical evidence of standard medical practice can be …

Making The Health Insurance Flexibility And Accountability (Hifa) Waiver Work Through Collaborative Governance, Barbara Zabawa

Faculty Works

This article examines the Health Insurance Flexibility and Accountability (HIFA) waiver introduced in 2001, focusing on its potential as a tool for collaborative governance in expanding health insurance coverage. The HIFA waiver grants states greater programmatic flexibility and encourages public-private partnerships, aiming to address the complex challenges of uninsured populations. Although the waiver has been criticized for possibly reducing benefits and increasing cost-sharing, the paper argues for its use as a vehicle to foster stakeholder collaboration. It highlights the importance of integrating diverse perspectives to design politically and economically viable health reforms. Challenges such as stakeholder engagement, accountability, and resource …

Against A Federal Patients' Bill Of Rights, Edward A. Zelinsky

Articles

The failure of the 107th Congress to pass a "Patients' Bill of Rights" (PBR) is widely considered a major disappointment, to be remedied in the 108th Congress by the adoption of such legislation. Indeed, federal PBR proposals have achieved the proverbial motherhood-and-apple-pie status; it is virtually impossible to find anyone actively opposing a federal PBR. Many members of the 108th Congress likely feel pressure to pass PBR legislation before returning to the electorate in 2004.

I advance a contrary perspective: A federal PBR is an idea whose time is past or, to be precise, is an idea whose rationales are …

Ethical, Legal, And Social Issues In Genetic Testing For Complex Genetic Diseases (With E. Zuiker), Lori B. Andrews

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Patient Advocacy And Termination From Managed Care Organizations: Do State Laws Protecting Health Care Professional Advocacy Make Any Difference?, Linda C. Fentiman

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

This article will explore the history, implementation, and impact of state advocacy protection statutes. The article is in four major parts. The first Part provides an introduction to the concept of advocacy, both as it was understood at common law, and as it is presently interpreted by HCPs and MCOs. The article will also examine the phenomenon of HCPs' “deselection,” that is, the termination or non-renewal of their contracts with MCOs. In this context, the article will highlight the distinction between anecdote and data and emphasize the paucity of hard evidence to support either side's version of the truth about …

Internet Pharmacies And The Need For A New Federalism: Protecting Consumers While Increasing Access To Prescription Drugs, Linda C. Fentiman

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

In this article I will argue that Internet pharmacies pose a significant public health problem, as they raise the classic eternal triangle of health care issues--access, quality, and financing--in a new technological context. Part II describes the phenomena of Internet pharmacies, and Part III reviews the present regulatory scheme. Part IV explains why the current legal framework is inadequate to address the public health and safety problems posed by Internet pharmacies, focusing particularly on the jurisdictional, constitutional, and practical obstacles to effective state oversight of Internet pharmacies. Part V argues that comprehensive federal oversight of Internet prescribing and dispensing is …

Protecting Human Research Subjects: A Jurisdictional Analysis, Jennifer Llewellyn, Jocelyn Downie, Robert Holmes

Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press

The most recent speech from the throne contained a pledge from the federal government to "work with provinces to implement a national system for the governance of research involving humans, including national research ethics and standards." This commitment signals a desire on the part of the federal government to address concerns about the inadequacies of the current governance of health research involving humans (RIH). To this end, Health Canada's Ethics Division is currently exploring the ways in which such a national governance system for RIH might be implemented. It is important for the federal government, as it moves toward making …

Protecting The Endangered Human: Toward An International Treaty Prohibiting Cloning And Inheritable Alterations, Lori B. Andrews

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

A Conceptual Framework For Genetic Policy, Lori B. Andrews

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Criminal Prosecution For Hmo Treatment Denial, John A. Humbach

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

This article will first provide a brief examination of the economic pressures that market forces bring to bear on HMOs and their decision-making personnel. The objective is to show how the natural effect of normal market forces is to exert a constant pressure towards treatment delays and denials, particularly in the cases of elderly and chronically ill patients. Part III will provide an overview of the existing criminal law as it applies to situations in which death results because someone has violated a legal duty to provide medical treatment. In Part IV, the question of the requisite mental culpability will …

Genetic And Metabolic Screening Of Newborns: Must Health Care Providers Seek Explicit Parental Consent?, Sheila Wildeman, Jocelyn Downie

Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press

In this paper, we provide some background on the history of newborn screening and the legal context within which questions regarding consent must be answered, and then turn to the various arguments that can be made for and against the current approach to parental consent to genetic and metabolic tests administered as part of provincial/territorial newborn screening programs. In the end, we conclude that either practice should be changed to align it with current law such that explicit parental consent is sought for the established tests, or that advocates for maintaining current practices should lobby for legislation permitting newborn screening …

Banning The Clone, Lori B. Andrews

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Current Issues In The Psychiatrist-Patient Relationship: Outpatient Civil Commitment, Psychiatric Abandonment And The Duty To Continue Treatment Of Potentially Dangerous Patients--Balancing Duties To Patients And The Public, Vanessa Merton, Linda C. Fentiman

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Reproductive Technology Comes Of Age, Lori B. Andrews

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Health Care Access For Children With Disabilities, Linda C. Fentiman

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

In the last twenty-five years, we have seen a remarkable evolution in attitudes and practice toward the treatment of children with disabilities. Children born with severe physical and mental anomalies are no longer routinely allowed to die. Many such children, along with those who become disabled later in childhood through illness or injury, receive aggressive life-saving medical treatment as well as continuing medical and habilitative care. Some children, particularly those whose families are affluent, receive substantial therapeutic and other supportive services that permit them to overcome their disabilities and function effectively in school and, later, at work.

Adoption, Reproductive Technologies And Genetic Information, Lori B. Andrews

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Is There A Right To Clone? Constitutional Challenges To Bans On Human Cloning, Lori B. Andrews

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Do The Dead Have Interests? Policy Issues For Research After Life (With D. Nelkin), Lori B. Andrews

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Aids As A Chronic Illness: A Cautionary Tale For The End Of The Twentieth Century, Linda C. Fentiman

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

The result of the monumental shifts in the structure and financing of health care delivery is that at the very time that medical innovations have made possible significant improvements in the quality and quantity of life for people with chronic illnesses, those who are responsible for paying for Americans' health care, in government and the private sector, seem to have finally said “Enough! We must cut costs, and cut them dramatically, and the simplest, most direct way of cutting costs is to deny coverage for certain kinds of treatments and certain kinds of illnesses.” People with HIV and AIDS are …

Checkpoints On The Conversion Highway: Some Trouble Spots In The Conversion Of Nonprofit Health Care Organizations To For-Profit Status, James J. Fishman

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

This essay does not address the truly important policy issues: whether for-profit healthcare should be allowed or encouraged; how the quality of care compares to nonprofits or what criteria should be used to evaluate the quality of care; or what the impact of these conversions is on the communities they serve. It discusses less significant issues: those of process—how can we shape and control this tidal wave of change so that the public will be served and charitable assets preserved to the maximum extent possible? The focus is upon the valuation of these charitable assets; the appropriate process of conversion; …

Body Science, Lori B. Andrews

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Utility Of International Law For Protecting Women's Health Rights, Vanessa Merton

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

There is one area, however, where international law seems to hold promise; certain cultural practices that pose special, direct threats to the lives and health of women (although male infants and children often share women's vulnerability in this regard). I have in mind sexual slavery, coercive prostitution and pornographic exploitation, rape, compulsory marriage, coerced impregnation and its converse, coerced abortion and sterilization; spousal abuse, dowry deaths and coerced suicide, female infanticide and sex-specific abortion. All of these practices are the product not of microbes, poor hygiene, or a lack of health care, but of deliberate human behavior. All these practices …

Introduction: Adapting Old Rules For A New Paradigm, Thomas A. Eaton

Scholarly Works

This Symposium brings together prominent practitioners and academic commentators in the field of health law. They are the authors of leading casebooks, treatises, and articles, and they craft the agreements that make "managed care" a practical reality. Collectively these authors explore a variety of cutting edge legal issues as our health system moves from a "fee-for-service" paradigm to one of managed care. These articles address such issues as tort liability for negligent care, fraud and abuse, disclosure of economic incentives to control costs, and antitrust. These seemingly disparate topics are united by a common theme: the need to adapt legal …

Prenatal Screening And The Culture Of Motherhood, Lori B. Andrews

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Shadow Health Care System: Regulation Of Alternative Health Care Providers, Lori B. Andrews

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Beyond Doctrinal Boundaries: A Legal Framework For Surrogate Motherhood, Lori B. Andrews

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Organ Donation As National Service: A Proposed Federal Organ Donation Law, Linda C. Fentiman

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

It is time to consider an alternative approach to organ procurement and allocation -- one that relies on presumed consent to organ donation, combined with incentives which recognize the communal basis of the obligation to donate one's organs after death. Such a system must provide numerous opportunities for “opting out” of donation in order to promote individual autonomy and use economic and eleemosynary incentives for persons to contribute their organs after death. Mere mention of the words “presumed consent” and “compensated donation” may raise ethical eyebrows. However, a system of presumed consent to compensated organ donation should be considered as …