Public Policy 

AHLA's Public Dialogue Sessions are one or one-and-a-half day non-partisan discussions that are facilitated by a panel of experts on a health policy topic with a clear legal nexus. The panel's findings are summarized and published in a comprehensive report that is distributed on a complimentary basis to members, policymakers, healthcare organizations, think tanks, academicians, media and the public. Since 1991, AHLA has held colloquiums and public interest dialogue sessions on a variety of health law topics.

• Convener on Stark Law (2009)
  AHLA's Public Interest Committee convened sixteen pre-eminent national experts on Stark law to discuss the efficacy of the federal physician self-referral statute. AHLA published a White Paper summarizing the main points for distrubition to government leaders and AHLA members.



• Pandemic and H5N1 Flu: A Prescription for Preparedness (2008)
  On May 2, 2008, AHLA's Public Interest Committee brought together a select but diverse panel of legal experts, healthcare providers, government leaders and healthcare and emergency management scholars to discuss the critical legal and ethical issues involved in pandemic preparedness planning. The primary purpose of the session was to bring together the subject matter experts to share their best thinking regarding legal impediments and implementation challenges to community pan-flu preparedness and practical solutions to such challenges as well as ways for healthcare providers to coordinate preparedness planning with local, state, and federal authorities to ensure practical utility. The session was co-sponsored by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Office of Inspector General, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. A Pan Flu Checklist was developed as a result of this dialogue session.



• Medical Necessity: Current Concerns and Future Challenges (2005)
  Medical Necessity, AHLA's eighth public interest dialogue session, was held in Washington, DC on March 31-April 1, 2005. The resulting report includes nine proposed, incremental changes on which the 12-member panel achieved consensus and one point of disagreement. The report also presents the initial framework of a more comprehensive approach to medical necessity determinations, based on "informed patient choice," that emerged from a special presentation and discussion led by noted Dartmouth epidemiologist and researcher John E. Wennberg, MD, MPH. Appendices to the report include a background paper on medical necessity that established a common basis for the discussion and a briefing paper on medical necessity and complementary and alternative medicine.



• Minimizing Medical Errors: Legal Issues in the Debate on Improving Patient Safety (2003)
  AHLA brought together a panel of 24 experts in Washington, DC from February 28 to March 1, 2003 to discuss the legal considerations from medical errors. Meaningful progress in reducing medical errors will not occur, the panel concluded, without national leadership, recognition of data collection/analysis as the cornerstone of a national patient safety initiative, and the use of incentives to encourage systemic changes within healthcare organizations and to remove disincentives to cooperative, collaborative behavior that promotes patient safety.



• Privacy of Health Information (2001)
  Health Lawyers' 2001 Colloquium focused on the broad policy considerations relating to privacy of health information.



• Fraud and Abuse: Do Current Laws Protect the Public Interest? (1999)
  Health Lawyers' 1999 Colloquium report provides analysis of the complex issues surrounding fraud and abuse laws that will help "frame the issue" for policymakers and others.



• Patient Care and Professional Responsibility: Impact of the Corporate Practice of Medicine Doctrine (1997)
  At Health Lawyers' 1997 Colloquium, experts from a wide range of constituency groups met to explore legal, policy, and practice issues related to patient care and professional responsibility.



• Legal Issues Related to Tax Exemption and Community Benefit (1995)
  This report is based on Health Lawyers' 1995 Colloquium, which focused on tax exemption and community benefit and clarification of the intersection of social policy and tax policy through a rigorous legal analysis of accountability standards and community benefit.



• Colloquium on Legal Issues Related to Clinical Practice Guidelines (1994)