Areas of Practice
Health law; Co-Chair of Health Information Technology/HIPAA Practice

Representative Experience
Health Information Technology: addressing of privacy, security and regulatory issues relating to electronic health records, including an electronic longitudinal community health record, telemedicine project, and electronic health records sponsored by health systems; advice on governance, anti-kickback, self-referral, tax-exemption, privacy, security, and confidentiality, and other legal issues relating to electronic health records

HIPAA: implementation of HIPAA compliance programs; ongoing HIPAA issues counsel; and assistance with responses to complaints and enforcement actions

Corporate compliance: program development, implementation and management; assistance with auditing and mitigation of potential compliance issues

Anti-kickback, Stark and self-referral restrictions

Patient care, consent, confidentiality and medical records requirements

Contract, transactional and corporate work

Physician recruitment and retention

Medical staff credentialing and peer review

Licensure, accreditation, certificate of need and other regulatory issues

Tax-exemption, private inurement, public benefit and intermediate sanctions

Prior Experience
Attorney: worked for several major national law firms focusing on health law

Registered nurse: worked at Children's Memorial Hospital in Chicago, Illinois, St. Jude's Hospital in Vieux Fort, St. Lucia, and in home health and physician practice settings

Representative Clients
Non-profit and proprietary, public and private, religious and secular, multi-institutional and individual health care providers and others working in or with the health care industry, including hospitals and academic medical centers, physicians and physician groups, business associates, and institutional review boards

Publications and Presentations
Co-Author and Contributing Editor, HIPAA Portability and Privacy Manual (Employee Benefits Institute of America)

Privacy Co-Chair and Co-Author, “The Quest for Interoperable Electronic Health Record: A Guide to Legal Issues in Establishing Health Information Networks,” American Health Lawyers Association (2005)

Sub-workgroup Chair and Co-Author, Preemption: Balancing Federal and State Regulation of Privacy for Confidential Health Care Information, Workgroup for Electronic Data Interchange – Strategic National Implementation Process (WEDI-SNIP), 2001

Co-Author, “The HIPAA Clock is Running: Final HIPAA Transaction and Code Sets Standards Finally Published,” Internet Health Care Strategies, December 2000

Author, "If You Thought Y2K was Something, Here Come HIPAA Privacy Standards," Health Law News (Washington State Bar Association Health Law Section), Spring 2000

Author, "Vertically Integrated Networks," a chapter in Managed Care, the third volume in the Health Corporate Law series (Little, Brown & Co., 1996; Aspen Publishing, 1998)

Author, "The Importance of Advance Directives," and "Living with the Data Bank Blues," both published by Chicago Medicine; The Right to Die Handbook: A Guide for Illinois Health Care Providers Dealing with Incompetent Patients, fourth edition

Frequent national speaker on topics including HIPAA, HIT, compliance, regulatory, anti-kickback, self-referral and confidentiality. Conferences include Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) Patient Safety and Health Information Technology Conference, HIT Summits, HIPAA Summits, HIPAA Colloquium at Harvard, HIPAA Security National Teleconference, and conferences sponsored by American Health Lawyers Association, Healthcare Financial Management Association, HIMSS, Washington State Society of Healthcare Attorneys, Alaska Bar Association, Hawaii HIPAA Readiness Coalition and Washington State Bar Association

Regularly quoted in national health publications including Modern Healthcare

Memberships and Activities
Named as one of the “Best Lawyers in America” in Health Care Law by Woodward/White

American Health Lawyers Association, Vice-Chair of Health Information Technology Practice Group

Workgroup for Electronic Data Interchange - Strategic National Implementation Project (WEDi - SNIP), chair of sub-workgroup on HIPAA preemption

Washington State Bar Association, past officer, Health Law Section

American Bar Association

Washington State HIPAA Readiness Forum, planning committee member

Washington State Society of Healthcare Attorneys

American Lung Association, trustee, member of executive committee

Listed in Who’s Who in America, Who’s Who among Women, and Who’s Who in Law

HIT/HIPAA Task Force, Davis Wright Tremaine, Co-Chair Licensed to practice law in Washington and Illinois

Education
B.S.N., magna cum laude, Nursing, Duke University, 1981

J.D., Loyola University of Chicago School of Law, 1986

• Dean's List each semester
  
• Editor, Women's Law Reporter