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A Minnesota law that created a union for home health providers for Medicaid recipients does not violate the state or U.S. constitutions, a federal appeals court held Thursday. A unanimous three-judge panel of the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed a ruling by a federal judge in Minneapolis that dismissed a 2014 lawsuit by six home health providers who sought to block the 2013 Individual Providers of Direct Support Services Representation Act. Similar laws are in place in California, Connecticut, Maryland and several other states. (Grzincic, 12/5)

A federal appeals panel has upheld the dismissal of a lawsuit brought by a Pennsylvania hospital against the federal government claiming Medicare underpaid it for skilled nursing services. A three-judge panel of the District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals on Tuesday said the lawsuit, filed by Canonsburg General Hospital, was barred by an earlier lawsuit the hospital brought over the same issue, in an opinion written by Circuit Judge Karen LeCraft Henderson. (Pierson, 12/4)

The U.S. Supreme Court agreed Friday to review the issue of whether healthcare providers who bill Medicaid and other government programs imply they are following all program requirements in so doing, including requirements for licensing and supervising their staff. So-called implied certification has been the basis for a number of whistleblower suits under the U.S. False Claims Act. The case the high court has chosen to take up was brought by Julio Escobar and his wife, Carmen Correa, the parents of a teenager who died of a seizure after being treated at a Lawrence, Massachusetts, mental-health center owned by Universal Health Services Inc. (Grzincic, 12/8)