Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Federal Judge Blocks Administration's New Rule That Allows Residents To Sue Nursing Homes
A federal judge in Mississippi issued an order Monday temporarily blocking a new rule from the Obama administration that gives patients at federally funded nursing homes the right to settle disputes in court. Judge Michael Mills of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Mississippi granted a request from members of the nursing home industry to stop the rule from taking effect on Nov. 28 while it鈥檚 being challenged in court. The new rule from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) prohibits any nursing home that accepts Medicare or Medicaid funds from putting pre-dispute arbitration clauses in resident contracts. (Wheeler, 11/7)
The rule, announced in September by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, would ban so-called pre-dispute binding arbitration clauses in nursing home contracts, which require patients and families to settle any dispute over care through arbitration, rather than the court system. The rule was supposed to take effect Nov. 28, but the American Health Care Association, an industry group that represents most nursing homes in the U.S., filed a lawsuit in October to block the rule, which it called "arbitrary and capricious." (Hersher, 11/7)
The AHCA argued that the rule exceeds the CMS' statutory authority and is wholly unnecessary to protect the health and safety of residents. In a 40 page-decision released Monday, Judge Michael Mills said he agreed. 鈥淎s sympathetic as this court may be to the public policy considerations which motivated the rule, it is unwilling to play a role in countenancing the incremental 'creep' of federal agency authority beyond that envisioned by the U.S. Constitution,鈥 Mills wrote. (Dickson, 11/7)
Federal efforts to crack down on nursing homes' use of mandatory arbitration agreements suffered a setback today, after a U.S. district court halted implementation of the new policy. Judge Michael Mills in a ruling issued this afternoon questioned CMS' authority to place the sweeping restriction on facilities that receive federal funds, saying it raises "serious legal questions" about the power that federal agencies wield. He granted a preliminary injunction preventing the arbitration ban from taking effect until a broader lawsuit against the rule is resolved. (Cancryn, 11/7)
