Hospitals and Other Providers Should Make Sure Any Items or Services of Value That They Provide to Their Referring Physicians To Alleviate Burnout Comply With the Stark Law - Amidst the ongoing labor market shortages and...more
As part of its recent rulemaking process, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) finalized a new exception to the Physician Self-Referral Law (the Stark Law) to protect arrangements where limited remuneration is...more
CMS made impactful changes to the Federal physician self-referral law’s (i.e., Stark Law’s) regulations in its Final Rule that were effective January 19, 2021 (with the exception of the changes to 42 C.F.R. § 411.352(i) that...more
The Situation: On November 20, 2020, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services ("CMS") released the long-awaited final rule to modernize and clarify the Stark Law. As part of this final rule, CMS reviewed stakeholder...more
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General (OIG) has issued a Policy Statement declaring that it will not impose administrative sanctions under the Federal Anti-Kickback Statute for certain...more
The Situation: The isolated transactions exception under the Stark Law has been used by some providers and entities to retroactively protect services arrangements that do not qualify for personal services or market value...more
On October 9, 2019, the Centers for Medicare and Medicare Services (CMS) released proposed changes to the regulations interpreting the Physician Self-Referral Law (Stark Law), including a new proposed exception for limited...more
As part of the long-awaited proposed changes “to modernize and clarify” the regulations that interpret the Physician Self-Referral Law (the “Stark Law”) released on October 9, 2019, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid...more
The Ethics in Patient Referrals Act (“Stark”) prevents hospitals from paying employed or contracted physicians in the same way that physicians are or were paid by independent physician groups. Specifically, physician groups...more
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) issued a rare advisory opinion (CMS-AO-2017-1) under the Stark Law (Section 1877 of the Social Security Act, codified at 42 U.S.C. § 1395) earlier this fall, addressing a...more
A clinical laboratory has received a green light from CMS to offer pop-up notifications alerting physicians of various potential issues (Laboratory Alerts) through its web-based portal for ordering and reporting results of...more
In a development that is limited in scope but still welcomed by hospitals, the proposed 2016 Physician Fee Schedule proposes a number of new exceptions to the physician self-referral or Stark law and other refinements that...more
Assistance to Employ a Non-Physician Practitioner (NPP) - Currently under the Stark law, the physician recruitment exception (42 C.F.R. § 411.357(e)) permits hospitals, Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHCs) and...more
The OIG recently posted an Advisory Opinion which concluded that a hospital's proposal to provide free access to an electronic interface between the hospital and area physicians for laboratory and diagnostic services was not...more