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New legislation has been introduced in congress to amend the Fair Labor Standards Act, the act which guarantees workers a minimum wage and overtime payment. The amendment seeks to make an exception for minor league baseball players. The MLB as well as the MiLB (the governing association for minor league baseball in America) have had their PR machines hard at work to convince everyone that this legislation is needed.

The MiLB website claims:

“The legislation would amend the federal Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) to clarify that Minor League Baseball players are not subject to a law that was intended to protect workers in traditional hourly-rate jobs. A pending lawsuit in a California federal court makes a first-of-its-kind claim that the federal overtime laws should apply to Minor League Baseball players.

Most of us drive vehicles to and from work and to take our kids where they need to go each day. This means we need our vehicles to be safe and reliable for our loved ones and families. Unfortunately, sometimes vehicles have faulty parts such as tires, door locks, brakes, air bags and more. This is when we have to put our trust into companies and manufacturers to tell us when there is a recall on these items so that we can make sure our families stay as safe as possible. However, what happens when the system that issues recalls for things like defective tires also fails. Then we have a big problem because our safety is at risk.

Investigators from the National Transportation Safety Board and Dr. Rob Molloy, acting director of the NTSB’s Office of Highway Safety, “The federal recall system that is supposed to keep potentially dangerous car tires off the road is “completely broken.” The investigators said that while each year tire problems cause 33,000 accidents and kill 500-plus motorists, only one in five defective tires is being taken out of service via recalls. More than half of recalled tires remain in use.

To help combat the epidemic of elder abuse, on March 30^th of 2016, the Department of Justice  made an announcement about the formal launch of 10 regional Elder Justice Task Forces designed to identify nursing homes and other long-term care  facilities that provide “grossly substandard care” to residents. This is similar to a team previously launched by the Department of Justice known as the Medicare Fraud Strike Force and Health Care Fraud Prevention & Enforcement Action Team or HEAT initiative, the newly created Elder Justice Task Forces will focus on coordination and information sharing among federal, state and local enforcement agencies to combat suspected cases of physical abuse and financial fraud of the elderly.

Every task force in this new Elder Justice Task Force  will consist of representatives from the U.S. Attorneys’ Offices, state Medicaid Fraud Control Units, state and local prosecutors’ offices, the Department of Health and Human Services, state Adult Protective Services agencies, Long-Term Care Ombudsman programs and other law enforcement officials. These task forces will also have a national footprint with locations in the following districts: Northern District of California, Northern District of Georgia, District of Kansas, Western District of Kentucky, Northern District of Iowa, District of Maryland, Southern District of Ohio, Eastern District of Pennsylvania, Middle District of Tennessee and the Western District of Washington.

These new Elder Justice Task forces mean that there is increased interest and attention being focused on the Long Term Care industry, maybe due in part to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services’ proposed rule, last summer, to overhaul requirements for participation by Long Term Care facilities in federal health care programs.

It is hard not to love Uber living in a city like Nashville. So many of us have used this service to get around town. It is a very popular service and company. However, it may be one of many companies trying to pay their workers as independent contractors instead of employees so they do not have to pay them the benefits and wages they are entitled to. If you or someone you work with feel that you have been misclassified and are not receiving the wages, overtime pay or benefits you deserve, then you should speak to a employment and overtime pay lawyer with the Higgins Firm. We will listen to your claim and help you get the compensation you are entitled to for the work that you have done.

According to this lawsuit filed last year by up to 385,000 drivers that were seeking  employee status and the associated benefits to which they would be entitled, the law requires that businesses must reimburse their employees for work-related expenses, which if drivers were classified as employees would include outlays for gas and parking that Uber and Lyft currently do not cover.

In the settlement Uber will pay $84 million to the plaintiffs, with a second payment of $16 million if its valuation increases a certain amount within a year after a public offering. The company’s latest round of venture capital financing disclosed in December valued it at $62.5 billion. Uber will also make changes to its policies, including giving more information on how and why the company bars drivers, and creating drivers associations in California and Massachusetts as appeals venues for workers who disagree with the company’s decisions.

Truck drivers are required by federal law to pass health tests before they drive, but many of these drivers keep certain medical conditions and problems a secret which could mean that they should not be on the road because it could be dangerous and lead to accidents. In one recent case, Ruthie Allen was one of thirty-five passengers that was injured when a Greyhound bus drove off an interstate. The driver allegedly blacked out. Allen stated that, “I started yelling at the driver but I didn’t get a response. The bus started to tumble. I looked down and I saw the bone in my thigh protruding through my clothing.”

The bus accident is still under investigation, however, according to the accident report the driver, Dwayne Garrett – told police he was drinking coffee, started coughing and lost consciousness. However, no coughing is heard on the dash camera video. A few weeks before the accident occurred, a Department of Transportation medical examiner suspected Garrett might have sleep apnea , a breathing condition that disrupts sleep and leads to fatigue. If untreated, it disqualifies a driver from operating a commercial vehicle like a bus. Garrett got a ninety day waiver and was told to get tested. When Garrett was questioned about what the doctor said, Garrett said that, “He claimed that I had one of the markers for sleep apnea, which was he could not see the back of my throat.”

According to reports, Garrett saw his his personal physician, Dr. Robert Kunkel, also a Department of Transportation examiner. He acknowledged the Department of Transportation’s suspicion about sleep apnea, but Kunkel claims Garret failed to disclose some key symptoms and a referral to get a sleep test, which he says prevented further evaluation. A court-ordered sleep test ultimately diagnosed Garrett with sleep apnea. He is now disqualified from driving commercially.

Leading stars of the United States women’s national team have filed a complaint with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission against U.S. Soccer, claiming wage discrimination relative to the men’s national team. Carli Lloyd told Matt Lauer on the “Today” show, “I think that we’ve proven our worth over the years. Just coming off of a 2015 Women’s World Cup win, the pay disparity between the men and women is just too large. And we want to continue to fight.”

The four other players that filed the complaint are goalkeeper Hope Solo, striker Alex Morgan, playmaker Megan Rapinoe and central defender and co-captain Becky Sauerbrunn. They feel that he women’s national team, which enjoys a national popularity that often exceeds the men’s in the mainstream, drives far more revenue to the U.S. Soccer Federation than they are compensated for. According to an investigation by the New York Daily News, the financial constructions that channel those incomes are so tousled that there’s no telling what money is brought in by the women and how much of it by the men. The women feel though that they have been stonewalled by the federation in their attempts to see the financial statements for themselves.

The women point to the vast disparity in performance bonuses.  The men’s team received more, a shared $2.5 million just for reaching the World Cup, than the women did for winning the entire thing, $1.8 million. A similar gap exists in all other bonuses as well. The men sometimes collect ten times more for winning a friendly than the women do. However, the women and not the men, , also receive a full-time salary from the federation of up to $72,000, not including up to hundreds of thousands in bonuses they typically collect, a baseline guarantee the men don’t enjoy. They are also compensated by the federation for participating in the National Women’s Soccer League.

When we go to the doctor and get medication for an illness or medical condition, we expect these medications to be safe and to help us feel better. Unfortunately, sometimes medications have dangerous side effects that can cause more problems and even end up making us worse than before we received the medication.   According to a recent lawsuit filed on December 15^th of 2015, the plaintiff claims that they did not know about the seriousness and particulars of the dangerous side effects of Invokana when she was prescribed the medication. She began taking the medication in December of 2014, when it had been on the market for about a year. She claims that soon after taking the medication, she developed diabetic ketoacidosis, alleged to be a serious, life-threatening condition about which the health care community has become increasingly aware as an emerging Invokana side effect among the many adverse events of Invokana.

The plaintiff, while alleging that she did not previously know about the seriousness of the Invokana side effects, has also claimed that Janssen, a unit of pharmaceutical giant Johnson & Johnson, failed to properly warn consumers about the possible risks and drawbacks of Invokana. The lawsuit claims that the Johnson &Johnson company failed to properly study and vet the type 2 diabetes drug before bringing it to market in 2013.

The lawsuit’s final claim is that Janssen improperly promoted Invokana off label for treatment of type 1 diabetes, as well as for the treatment of hypertension. Doctors have always carried the blessing of the US Food and Drug Administration  in prescribing drugs for indications not necessarily approved by the FDA. The thinking being that doctors have the capacity to study and understand the formulation of drugs, and thus are in a position to undertake a medical judgment call on behalf of their patients. The FDA, in this way, defers to the doctor. However, it is illegal for pharmaceuticals and manufacturers to market a drug off label, for uses and indications not specifically approved by the FDA.

 Recently, a jury made a dramatic ruling in favor of five individual plaintiffs after a long consolidated trial about the defective Pinnacle Hip Implants manufactured by DePuy Orthopaedics and Johnson & Johnson have been awarded $502 million. In this case, DePuy Orthopaedics and Johnson & Johnson was found liable  for hiding flaws in its Pinnacle line of metal on metal artificial hips that caused the devices to fail prematurely and left them facing revision surgeries and pain. The jury found that the hips sold by J&J’s DePuy unit under the Pinnacle brand name were defective and company officials knew about the flaws but failed to warn patients and doctors of the risks.

The jury found that DePuy took a number of short cuts getting the Pinnacle hip implants on the market, in part due to the 510(k) approval process, which only requires a device be substantially equivalent to devices already in use. The company did not seek premarket approval, and so avoided the Food and   Drug Administration’s requirement to determine if a device is safe or effective. There were no Pinnacle hip clinical trials to see if it even worked, or if it was safe to use.

The Food and Drug Administration released new guidance for metal-on-metal hip replacements in January 2013, indicating that doctors should only use the design if other artificial hip implants are not appropriate. The agency also determined that future metal-on-metal hip designs will be required to undergo extensive human clinical trials before they will be approved.

The Tennessee Supreme Court issued a recent opinion clarifying what law can be used to prove negligence on behalf of a nursing home. The decision came as a result of a case brought by on behalf of a nursing home resident, Martha S. French. Specifically, the daughter of Ms. French brought a wrongful death case against the Stratford House nursing home claiming ordinary negligence and negligence per se. The lawsuit led to the filing of a motion for partial summary judgment, dismissing the negligence per se and Tennessee Adult Protection Act claims in addition to the claim for punitive damages. The Court of Appeals affirmed in part, but vacated the order dismissing the punitive damages claim. The administrator of the estate appealed.

According to this case, Martha French was fifty-four years old when she suffered her second stroke and was admitted to Highland Manor Nursing Home in 2000. After three years, Ms. French’s daughter arranged for her to be transferred to Stratford House, a long-term care facility in Chattanooga, TN. When she was admitted to the nursing home, French did not have any pressure sores. The nursing home’s care plan recognized that French had limited mobility which made her a risk for developing pressure sores. The care plan stated that French should be turned and repositioned frequently by nursing home staff, kept clean and dry after incontinence, and provided adequate hydration and nutrition.

While she was at Stratford House, French’s condition worsened. Then, on July 23, 2003, Ms. French’s daughter again moved her mother, this time to Erlanger Medical Center. Ms. French had a low-grade fever and low blood pressure. Doctors at Erlanger tried to increase her blood pressure as well as treat a urinary tract infection and a number of infected pressure ulcers. Despite these efforts, Ms. French developed pulmonary swelling and required help breathing. Ms. French died on July 26, 2003 from sepsis. French’s estate determined that she suffered from decubitus ulcers that were so severe that the kidney became necrotic and infected. These injuries became septic and led to her death. The estate alleged that Stratford Home failed to provide the medical treatment and ordinary care that Ms. French’s condition required.