As much of the nation eagerly anticipates a pending United States Supreme Court ruling regarding whether a collective action ban included in an employer’s arbitration agreement is lawful under the National Labor Relations Act, a Wisconsin federal court has decided to uphold a class arbitration award in a wage and hour case.
Continue reading...Jeffrey W. Stempel, Doris S. and Theodore B. Lee Professor of Law at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, William S. Boyd School of Law, has published “Notes from a Quiet Corner: User Concerns About Reinsurance Arbitration – And Attendant Lessons for Selection of Dispute Resolution Forums and Methods,” 9 Arbitration Law Review 93 (2017).
Continue reading...The Texas A&M University School of Law has beefed up its ADR curriculum after welcoming Professor Nancy Welsh as Director of the Aggie Dispute Resolution Program this fall.
Continue reading...A hospital has asked the Supreme Court of Texas to consider whether an arbitrator exceeded his authority in a workplace discrimination dispute.
Continue reading...Joost Pauwelyn, Professor of International Law at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies (IHEID) in Geneva, Switzerland, Co-Director of the Institute’s Centre for Trade and Economic Integration (CTEI), and Visiting Professor at Georgetown University Law Center in Washington, DC, has published “Baseball Arbitration to Resolve International Law Disputes: Hit or Miss?” Florida Tax Review, Vol. 22, 2018.
Continue reading...by Holly Hayes The U.S. Department of Defense has published an on-line Professional Conduct Toolkit designed to help put a stop to disruptive behaviors in healthcare that “undermine team effectiveness, contribute to unhealthy work environments, and put patients at risk.” The toolkit consists of four modules: Professional Conduct, Teamwork, and Patient Safety Responding to Behaviors that Undermine Safe Patient Care Supporting engagement: The Role of Leaders and System Responses High-Conflict Personalities, Mental Health Issues, and Safety Considerations The Toolkit also contains tipsheets, a checklist and tools and guides for implementing initiatives within your healthcare organization. Please share any information you have about addressing disruptive behavior in healthcare with us and our readers. Technorati Tags: Mediation Holly Hayes is a mediator at Karl Bayer, Dispute Resolution Expert where she focuses on mediation of health care disputes. Holly holds a B.A. from Southern Methodist University and a Masters in Health Administration from Duke University. She can be reached at holly@karlbayer.com.
Continue reading...by Holly Hayes In June, we discussed the passage of Texas House Bill 2256, which provides a procedure for mediation of out-of-network health benefit claim disputes. Patients in Texas now have the option to mediate when they are ‘balance-billed’ by their insurance company for services provided by out-of-network facility-based physicians like radiologists, pathologists, neonatologists, and emergency room physicians. (post available here) In October, the Dallas Morning News reported on the practice of ‘balance billing.’ The article cited an example of a patient who went to an emergency room in Denton to receive treatment. The hospital was in his insurer’s network, but the emergency room physician was not. The patient was billed for the balance not paid by his insurer. (read more here) In November H.R. 3962, the “Affordable Health Care for America Act,” was introduced in the U.S. House. (bill status is here) In the definition of “cost sharing,” the bill specifically excludes “balance billing amounts for non-network providers” in out-of-pocket payments which are capped for an individual at $5,000 or $10,000 for a family. Balance billed amounts would not be included in the out-of-pocket caps. (read more here) According to the Wall Street Journal, while other states have addressed aspects of ‘balance billing,’ no other states appear to have included an option for patients to request mediation for resolution of ‘balance billing’ amounts. Some states have banned ‘balance billing’ of the patient altogether. In January, the California Supreme Court ruled that emergency-room patients can no longer be billed by hospitals and doctors for treatment that is not fully paid for by their health plans and that billing disputes must be resolved solely between providers and health plans. The California Department of Managed Health Care said that Connecticut, Alabama, and Pennsylvania have also banned ‘balance billing.’ (read more here) Technorati Tags: Healthcare, ADR, law, mediation Holly Hayes is a mediator at Karl Bayer, Dispute Resolution Expert where she focuses on mediation of health care disputes. Holly holds a B.A. from Southern Methodist University and a Masters in Health Administration from Duke University. She can be reached at: holly@karlbayer.com.
Continue reading...By Holly Hayes As noted in a previous post (available here) Texas House Bill 2256, signed into law on June 19, 2009, provides a procedure for mediation of out-of-network health benefit claim disputes. The law gives patients the option to mediate when they are ‘balance-billed’ by their insurance company for services provided by out-of-network facility-based physicians like radiologists, pathologists, and neonatologists. ‘Balance billing’ occurs when a physician bills a patient for the difference between what the physician charges for a service and what an insurer pays the physician for that service. When a physician is not in-network for an insurer, there is no contracted payment rate that the physician has agreed to accept from the insurer so the insurer can pay what is deemed appropriate and the patient is billed for the difference. At the federal level, H.R. 3962, the “Affordable Health Care for America Act” is currently being considered in Congress. The bill defines ‘cost sharing’ (see bottom of page 9) and specifically excludes “premiums, balance billing amounts for non-network providers, or spending for non-covered services.” Although the bill says that out-of-pocket payments are capped for an individual at $5,000 or $10,000 for a family, out-of-network balance billing amounts are not included in those caps. Find out more at the The Wall Street Journal Health Blog (here). Look for an analysis of how other states are approaching ‘balance billing’ in a future post. Technorati Tags: Healthcare, ADR, law, mediation Holly Hayes is a mediator at Karl Bayer, Dispute Resolution Expert where she focuses on mediation of health care disputes. Holly holds a B.A. from Southern Methodist University and a Masters in Health Administration from Duke University. She can be reached at: holly@karlbayer.com.
Continue reading...Disputing is published by Karl Bayer, a dispute resolution expert based in Austin, Texas. Articles published on Disputing aim to provide original insight and commentary around issues related to arbitration, mediation and the alternative dispute resolution industry.
To learn more about Karl and his team, or to schedule a mediation or arbitration with Karl’s live scheduling calendar, visit www.karlbayer.com.
Disputing is published by Karl Bayer, a dispute resolution expert based in Austin, Texas. Articles published on Disputing aim to provide original insight and commentary around issues related to arbitration, mediation and the alternative dispute resolution industry.
To learn more about Karl and his team, or to schedule a mediation or arbitration with Karl’s live scheduling calendar, visit www.karlbayer.com.