By ANDREW L. SPARKS
Dickinson Wright

The Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFCRA) was enacted in March 2020 as part of the government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The FFCRA, among other things, provided funds for diagnostic testing and services for people without insurance for COVID-19. These funds were distributed through the COVID-19 Claims Reimbursement to Health Care Providers and Facilities for Testing, Treatment, and Vaccine Administration for the Uninsured Program (HRSA uninsured program). Providers seeking reimbursement under the HRSA uninsured program were required to enroll as a provider participant and check to ensure that patients were uninsured.

The HRSA uninsured program paid out more than $24.5 billion in claims. With the passage [Read More]

Lansing Lines is presented in cooperation with MIRS, a Lansing-based news and information service.

Organ Donor Education May Be Mandatory Part Of 9th Grade

A pandemic-era change to Michigan’s driver’s training program means new drivers may wait in fewer Secretary of State lines, but reworked visit schedules means they will also be asked to opt in as an organ donor before completing an educational segment about the registry.

The solution? Rep. Felicia Brabec (D-Ann Arbor) proposed the creation of an hour-long organ donor education program for Michigan’s ninth graders.

Patrick Wells-O’Brien, vice president of communications and external relations for non-profit registry Gift of Life Michigan, said Michigan is in the middle of the [Read More]

Missing from the Gretchen Whitmer’s State of the State address late last month were her calls for paid family leave and prescription drug affordability – both items she wanted to see get done before the end of last year.

Whitmer’s August 2023 “What’s Next?” Address highlighted proposals she wanted moved in Lansing during the first year of a Democratic-led House, Senate and executive office in 40 years.

The “clean energy” by 2040 proposal and the elimination of numerous state abortion regulations were both endorsed by the governor in her August speech and passed before mid-November. Whitmer’s priorities for paid family leave and a prescription drug affordability board were left behind, and didn’t [Read More]

By ROBIN FIELDS & MAYA MILLER
ProPublica/Co-published with The Capitol Forum

In a victory for many cancer patients in Michigan, the state’s top insurance regulator told health plans last month that they cannot deny coverage for clinically proven cancer treatments, and she made it clear for the first time that this includes cutting-edge genetic and biologic therapies.

The move follows weeks of questions from ProPublica and pressure from state lawmakers after the news organization reported in November that an insurer there refused to pay for the only treatment that could save the life of Forrest VanPatten, a 50-year-old father of two, even though a state law requires insurers to pay for proven cancer drugs.

Internal [Read More]

By SUSAN ADELMAN, MD
We all have heard that Tik Tok should be banned, but usually for political reasons. Few in the medical community realize the medical and public health dangers that kids are exposed to when they go on this platform. Along with alluring dance routines are enticing challenges to do completely ridiculous, unbelievably dangerous pranks—dangerous to the self and to others. Does anyone older than a teenager know what these challenges are? Let us go through some of them.

One is so dangerous and has caused so many deaths that Tik Tok has put up a warning message on their platform – the Blackout Challenge.  In this one, the child [Read More]

By: Jesse Adam Markos, Esq.
Wachler & Associates, P.C

Michigan is currently facing a shortage of healthcare providers that has escalated to unprecedented levels.  In response, Michigan’s Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs (“LARA”) has taken steps to enhance efforts to recruit and retain providers.  One such step is the formation of a task force to identify obstacles that prevent Foreign Trained Medical Professionals (“FTMPs”) from practicing in Michigan and to create recommendations to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the licensing process.  The resulting Michigan Task Force on Foreign Trained Medical Professional Licensing (“Task Force”) has done just that in its recently released Final Report.

As background, the Task Force was created [Read More]

By SETH WAXMAN
Dickinson Wright

The United States Department of Justice (“DOJ”) and state law enforcement agencies have robust teams investigating and prosecuting health care fraud. Law enforcement often uses advanced data analytics and algorithmic methods to identify newly emerging health care fraud schemes. DOJ also employs nine regional strike forces located throughout the country to bring together groups of prosecutors, FBI agents, and key administrative agencies to combat health care fraud. Critical time will be lost, and important steps may be missed if an organization waits until an investigation is underway to decide how to respond to a government investigation.

6 Steps for Responding to a Search Warrant

1. Company policy

Health care [Read More]

Lansing Lines is presented in cooperation with MIRS, a Lansing-based news and information service.

Abortion Provider, Student Group Challenge Access Restrictions

A Michigan abortion provider and a pro-abortion rights student group filed a Michigan Court of Claims case challenging three abortion restrictions, including Michigan’s 24-hour waiting period.

Northland Family Planning Centers and Medical Students for Choice also challenge the dissemination of certain information to a patient before an abortion and prohibitions on the ability of advanced practice clinicians to perform abortions, according to the lawsuit filed recently.

“Through the RFFA, Michigan voters overwhelmingly declared that they will not tolerate paternalistic and medically baseless restrictions on abortion like those we are challenging in this [Read More]

By JULIE APPLEBY
It’s winter, that cozy season that brings crackling fireplaces, indoor gatherings — and a wave of respiratory illness. Nearly four years since the pandemic emerged, people are growing weary of dealing with it, but the virus is not done with us.

Nationally, a sharp uptick in emergency room visits and hospitalizations for COVID-19, influenza, and respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV, began in mid-December and appears to be gaining momentum.

Here are a few things to know this time around:

What’s Circulating Now?

The COVID virus is continually changing, and a recent version is rapidly climbing the charts. Even though it appeared only in September, the variant known as JN.1, a descendant of [Read More]

As of Dec. 2, Michigan was trailing behind last year’s administered flu shot numbers by more than 10 percent, which is a setback that’s caught the attention of the Michigan State Medical Society.

“The biggest risk would be to have a very severe flu season, with many severe illnesses requiring (hospitalization),” said Dr. M. Salim Siddiqui, MSMS president. “I think we all have a sense of what happens when our hospitals get overwhelmed by respiratory illness. For older patients and younger patients, there (would) be (concerns) about severe permanent complications and even death.”

During a recent roundtable discussion, lasting around 20 minutes, Siddiqui described the influenza vaccine as a way to avoid respiratory [Read More]