Health Law

Catalog description

The Health Law course provides an introduction to a range of fundamental legal issues involved with the delivery of health care in the United States. Broadly speaking these issues fall in three categories: the provision of health care, the financing of health care, and the availability of health care. The course will usually cover at least the physician-patient relationship, the regulation and liability of health care providers and institutions, and basics of healthcare financing. In any particular year it might also consider other topics such as public health law (relating to measures intended to improve the health of the population as a whole); fraud and abuse; quality, access, and choice, including issues of equity and discrimination; reproductive rights; health information privacy; bioethical issues (such as assisted dying and treatment of those without decision-making capacity); and regulation of research involving human subjects. Health law occurs at the intersection of public policy (including public health policy) and the deeply personal, and it raises fundamental issues about the role of government and the rights of the individual, which themselves intertwine with social, economic, cultural, and ethical forces in this country. Students in the course will grapple with these issues as they work through the material. Credit Hour : 1-4 Recommended: LAW 5310 Administrative Law may be helpful