ESG in Healthcare: Addressing Key Considerations and Risks

Course Details
- smart_display Format
On-Demand
- signal_cellular_alt Difficulty Level
- work Practice Area
Health
- event Date
Thursday, March 23, 2023
- schedule Time
1:00 p.m. ET./10:00 a.m. PT
- timer Program Length
90 minutes
-
This 90-minute webinar is eligible in most states for 1.5 CLE credits.
This CLE webinar will guide healthcare counsel on ESG in the healthcare industry. The panel will discuss the increased focus on ESG and the key risks and benefits that healthcare providers and administrators need to consider in light of the legal and regulatory framework in which these organizations operate. The panel will discuss the risks and considerations from multiple perspectives, and dissect the issues in the E, S and G.
Faculty

Ms. Ferrari has more than 25 years of experience in the healthcare industry in various counsel, consulting and leadership roles. She serves clients inside and outside of Pinnacle, providing assistance with compliance strategy, risk management, due diligence, investigations, and litigation.
Her practice experience is national in scope and includes providing transactional, operational, governance, and dispute resolution support for a broad array of nonprofit, for-profit, and governmental clients, including hospitals and health systems, physicians and physician groups, clinical laboratories, and pharmaceutical and medical device vendors, distributors, and manufacturers. She has assisted clients with structuring, documenting, managing, and, when appropriate, defending financial arrangements involving healthcare providers, often with attention to requirements and implications of the Stark Law, Anti-kickback Statute, False Claims Act, non-profit tax regulations, Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and/or the various state laws concerning billing, payment and corporate practice of medicine. Her work has included assisting clients with mergers and acquisitions, affiliations, joint ventures, public-private partnerships, enterprise-level compliance programs, and healthcare workforce recruitment and management arrangements, including significant incentive, independent contractor, and employment arrangements that exceed $1 million in annual compensation. Her work has also included outside general and special counsel services for healthcare clients, focusing on their contracting and compensation practices.

Ms. Jacobs focuses her practice in the area of healthcare transactions. Calling upon her years of dedicated experience, she provides practical, pragmatic advice to help her clients achieve their strategic goals. Within the highly regulated health care industry, Ms. Jacobs advises clients, including hospitals, health systems, AMCs and large physician groups, on transactions. She serves as a regulatory adviser, providing fraud and abuse analysis in the context of a deal and ensuring her clients remain compliant with the regulations that govern health care transactions.

Ms. White has assisted Northwell in advancing its commitment to improve and expand the scope and accessibility of high-quality cost-efficient health care services including through affiliations, joint ventures and other collaborations with other health systems and care providers. She also serves as Secretary, General Counsel and Vice President of several collaborative provider entities, including the Northwell Health Cancer Institute and the Northwell Health ACO.
Prior to joining Northwell, she worked at the Federal Trade Commission, where she received the 2013 Award for Outstanding Scholarship based on her work as a lead author and editor of Antitrust and Health Care: A Comprehensive Guide, Washington, DC, American Health Lawyers Association, 2013. During her earlier tenure in the FTC’s Health Care Division in Washington D.C., she received the Stephen Nye Award as outstanding junior attorney. She also served as a Technical Advisor to the Russian Federation on antitrust matters, resident in Russia. Additionally, she spent many years as a partner in the health law and antitrust practice groups of national law firms.
She is member of the Board of Directors of the American Health Law Association where she currently serves as Chair of the Board Governance Committee and is a member of the Executive Committee. She also is a member of the Executive Committee of the Antitrust Section of the New York State Bar Association. She is also a Lecturer in Law at Columbia Law School, where she teaches the Business of Health Law.
Description
Like other industries, healthcare has seen increased interest from regulators, investors/donors, communities, staff, counsel, insurers and clients regarding organizational attention to ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) principles and practices. An appropriate commitment to ESG principles and practices- whether called ESG or something else- can enhance the awareness and culture of responsibility within an organization and improve government, employee, patient and public relations in a way that may significantly reduce risk and positively affect culture immediately and over time. More directly, with pending federal proposals to require ESG reporting for publicly traded companies, and with the public and Congress increasingly focused on questions about the continuing validity of tax-exempt status of non-profit hospitals, a commitment to ESG principles and practices may be an imperative for some healthcare organizations. From proper waste disposal (E), to executive, professional and staff compensation and benefits policies (S), to Board composition, incentives and processes (G), ESG principles and practices are important considerations for healthcare organizations.
On the opposite side of the ESG momentum are antitrust concerns raised against the ESG movement. At the close of 2022, certain members of Congress raised alarm and called for investigations into whether certain organizations acting collectively in the name of ESG are violating antitrust laws. Although the antitrust concerns are primarily focused on environmental activist organizations that are seeking to exert influence in the fossil fuel industry, they raise broader questions about the level of care needed when undertaking ESG initiatives.
Listen as our authoritative panel of healthcare attorneys examines ESG in the healthcare industry. The panel will discuss the increased focus on ESG and the key risks and benefits that healthcare providers and administrators need to consider in light of the legal and regulatory framework in which these organizations operate. The panel will discuss the risks and considerations from multiple perspectives, and dissect the issues in the E, S and G.
Outline
- Overview of ESG’s Importance in Healthcare
- What it means for healthcare investors/donors, communities, staff, counsel, insurers and patients
- How ESG fits in the unique regulatory structure of healthcare, including Federal fraud and abuse laws and state provider licensing and corporate practice of medicine (CPOM) laws
- How ESG influences and impacts other pressing healthcare priorities and needs, such as professional staffing shortages, financial integrity, regulatory compliance, advancing value-based care, DEI and health equity
- How ESG influences transactions and questions of value
- Policy issues and key considerations
- A 2023 overview of the laws and regulations that may be implicated by ESG practices and policies (or lack of ESG policies and practices), including antitrust laws
- A balanced look at the risks and risk mitigation questions for undertaking-- or not undertaking-- ESG strategies
- Case studies of implementation questions for ESG, in light of the legal and regulatory questions that must be addressed
Benefits
The panel will review these and other important issues:
- How is the healthcare industry responding to the increased demand and focus on ESG?
- What factors should healthcare organizations consider when integrating ESG priorities?
- What kinds of tools and metrics can healthcare organizations employ to monitor ESG performance?
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