AHLA's Speaking of Health Law

The Lighter Side of Health Law - August 2022

August 26, 2022 AHLA Podcasts
AHLA's Speaking of Health Law
The Lighter Side of Health Law - August 2022
Show Notes Transcript

AHLA's monthly podcast featuring health lawyer and blogger Norm Tabler's informative and entertaining take on recent health law and other legal developments. 

To learn more about AHLA and the educational resources available to the health law community, visit americanhealthlaw.org.

Speaker 1:

This episode of ALA. Speaking of health law is brought to you by HLA members and donors like you. For more information, visit American health law.org.

Speaker 2:

Hi, I'm norm Taber with this month's edition of the lighter side of health law. You mean this was just a drill is a question. Advent health nurses in Ocala, Florida were asking a few minutes after they heard a gunshot and a man with a semi-automatic weapon burst into their conference room and ordered them to lie flat on the floor, scaring the be Jesus out of them. One brave nurse managed to stop her hand from shaking long enough to call 9 1 1. Well, as you can guess, from the title advent health then said to the nurses, Hey, chill out. It's only a drill. Pretty realistic, huh? Well, yes, it was realistic. So realistic that the nurses were frightened to death. And now two of them have sued the hospital for putting them through the ordeal. Why didn't I think of that any day now, there won't be any cases of monkey box and you'll never hear about monkey box again. Why? Because the world health organization is going to rename it. It's part of a program to avoid offense to any cultural national, regional or ethnic group never underestimate the lobbying cloud of monkeys, bad news for robots. Well, as we predicted a couple of months ago, the court of appeals for the federal circuit has ruled that only a quote natural person can be an inventor and get a patent, an artificial intelligence system, AI for short, can't get a patent by the way, when you see AI in print is your first thought that it's Al as in Al Roker or is it just me? But back to the decision, it means of course that Robbie, the robot and Al from 2001 space Odyssey could never get a patent, no matter how good their invention is. When a reporter asked Robbie, if it's true, he's thinking about leaving the country, Robbie responded you bet I am. So is how the case is Fowler versus vial, federal circuit, careful how you phrase it. Here's a case that shows you need to be careful in choosing your words. The university of Mississippi med center and Mississippi blue cross blue shield reached an impass over the health systems request for higher reimbursement rates. The deadline for renewal passed with no agreement. So the system took to the airwaves in social media to say that blue cross was forcing the system out of its network, dropping it from the network, nothing new there, but here's what is new now blue cross has sued the hospital's top executives for defamation alleging that using words like force exclude and drop are defamatory. We didn't force anybody to do anything or drop anybody from anything. Blue cross says, we offered the rates, we think are fair and the system rejected them. If you're wondering why blue cross sued the executives instead of the system, it's because Mississippi law grants, the system immunity from defamation committed by its employees, law imitating art. Many of us became lawyers in part because we were influenced by the portrayal of law on television and, and movies. And sadly, many of us have been a little disappointed at how undramatic law practice really is. Well, here's a real life case that proves that law can be as dramatic as Perry Mason for life products. FLP brought a trademark infringement case against Viox technologies alleging that Viox infringed on its rejuvenate brand trademark and FLP had formidable proof lb catalogs with the rejuvenate brand label dating back to 2016. Defendant Viox thought that evidence looked too good to be true. So they hired a forensic photographic expert and he found that the photos had been photoshopped. The original photos and the catalog had been replaced with new ones, bearing the rejuvenate name, the clincher in one photo, the original purple label had been replaced with a red label, but Perry Mason alert a mirror in the photo, still reflected the old purple label. The judge gave LP the death sentence, dismissal with prejudice and ordered it to pay Viox$400,000 in attorney's fees. And you thought law was boring. The case is, or was four life products versus Viox technologies, Western district, Virginia life imitating children's literature. Here's a case that sounds for all the world, like a Peter rabbit story down in Georgia, 70 year old judge, Eddie Anderson, allegedly stole peace from the P ATCH of a farmer whose name may or may not have been Mr. McGregor. When the farmer took judge Eddie to task for the P theft judge, Eddie threatened physical violence, leading the farmer to report him to the Georgia bureau of investigation, which led to the GBI arresting judge Eddie, not for P theft, but for making terroristic threats, leading judge Eddie to resign from his judge ship a sort of pee or get off the bench. Tail high caliber hospital marketing Hudson regional hospital's marketing director, Ruben alone layoff must have been planning some high caliber marketing. How do I know? Because when the police searched the hospital in response to a bomb threat, which turned out to be a hoax, guess what they found in Ruben's office, 11 handguns, 27 rifles and shotguns, and a 45 caliber semiautomatic rifle. That's 39 weapons in all Hudson. Regional is not a large hospital, but I guess Ruben thought they could outgun the competition. Reen is now the hospital's ex marketing director celebrating in the end zone, California med mal lawyer, Bob McKenna was not content with a defense verdict for his physician client in a wrongful death case, a verdict that took only 26 minutes of jury deliberation. No. He had to Regal his colleagues with how completely he had fooled a jury. My client probably did negligently kill a patient. He wrote, but we made it look like other people did it. He then had his partner ring a victory bell. Well Bob's firm was so proud of his vivid play by play that they posted a video of it on the firm's social page. The backlash was so severe that they took it down, but not before it had been downloaded and reposted countless times. One of the kindest comments about the video was quote absolutely sickening Bob's explanation. I didn't know I was being recorded sometimes. That's what you don't say like many people in their sixties, Hawaii resident, Marilyn Al Ghassan was experiencing low back pain. Orthopedic surgeon. Kenneth Kahn diagnosed a generation between the fourth and fifth lumbar vertebrae. He recommended a fusion using a procedure called extreme lateral inner body fusion, where the spine is approached from the side rather than the back. Marilyn signed a consent form that frankly, you and I would've said was Bulletproof and Dr. Ken operated later when Marilyn experienced thigh pain, apparently from nerve injury during the procedure, she sued Dr. Ken alleging lack of informed consent. When Dr. Ken was awarded summary judgment, she appealed the court of appeals vacated, Dr. Ken's victory ruling that Marilyn's consent was not fully informed. Why? Because Dr. Ken had failed to tell her that he had performed the lateral procedure only four times. So the problem was what the consent form did not say. The case is alga Hasan versus Khan, Hawaii court of appeals, the complaint department, I've decided to open a complaint department, a part of the podcast for complaints about things that bother me or bother you. This month's complaint is about the term. Walk back. As in today, the governor walked back his earlier statement on taxes. Why does it bother me? Let me count the ways first. It makes no sense. Walking is not involved. It's talking, not walking. Second. It puts words in the mouth of someone who never spoke them. Nobody ever said I walked back that earlier statement. No, it's always somebody other than the speaker, as when a reporter says today, the governor walked back earlier. Comments, third it's hopelessly vague. Did the governor retract his statement, modify, clarify condition it who knows fourth and probably most important walk back is a new usage. And I hate new usages. I like the old ones I'm comfortable with. If you have anything for my complaint department, send it to me. Well, that's it for this month's edition. I hope you liked it. I'll be back next month with another edition of the lighter side of health long.

Speaker 1:

Thank you for listening. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to ALA speaking of health law, wherever you get your podcasts to learn more about ALA and the educational resources available to the health law community, visit American health law.org.