Creating a marketing strategy for a health and wellness brand is tough. Creating a marketing strategy that adheres to legal compliance requirements is even tougher. Developing a marketing strategy to make your brand stand out from the crowd is no easy task in an industry as competitive as health or wellness. On top of that, you need to follow numerous laws, regulations, and guidelines to ensure that your marketing strategy is legally compliant. Not only is adherence to the law critical for maintaining the trust and safety of your audience, but it is also necessary to avoid severe legal repercu ..read more

Are you like so many businesses I see that offers wellness services across the United States, perhaps through a virtual platform? If so, pay attention. Depending on the type of services you offer, you may be subject to state laws regarding refunds and cancellation policies. Let me give you an example: A fitness company offers a membership program to anyone, anywhere. Customers can pay in advance and receive a discount or pay monthly. The fitness company’s Terms and Conditions indicate that no refunds are available once the customer pays for the membership. However, customers that are unable to ..read more

Private equity firms are eating up physician practices, and they are not slowing down. According to a recent report from the American Antitrust Institute (hereinafter the AAI Report), private equity acquisitions of physician practices increased from 75 deals in 2012 to 484 deals in 2021. In some urban areas, a private equity firm might own 30% or more of the physician practices, which reduces competition and as studies are showing, increases prices for consumers. Private equity ownership of physician practices is a relatively new phenomenon, and there is a lot we don’t know about the impact of ..read more

As the traditional health system continues to fail patients and providers alike, more people are turning to wellness to fill in the gaping hole left by traditional health care. For those wellness practitioners wanting to serve clients as a health, wellness or lifestyle coach, aruveyda or reiki practitioner, yoga instructor, personal trainer, massage therapist, holistic health practitioner, functional medicine practitioner, nutrition counselor or many of the other titles that identify as wellness, a critical question you may ask is whether you are subject to the privacy and security rules of th ..read more

It may come as a surprise that many services we classify as “wellness services” do not require a state-issued license, either for the practitioner delivering the service or the business offering the service. Some practitioners believe that a certification from a wellness education provider, such as for health coaches, reiki practitioners, mindfulness practitioners, personal trainers, yoga instructors, nutrition consultants, energy healers, just to name a few, is the same as a state-issued license. It is not. Having a certification may be very helpful for gaining knowledge and credibility in th ..read more

As a wellness lawyer, I hear all kinds of complaints from all kinds of different stakeholders in the wellness industry. Lately, I have been hearing from people wronged by health and business coaches. These individuals have been hurt emotionally and financially by unethical coaches. This emotional or financial injury may occur because the coach oversteps their scope of practice, or because their business policies, such as refunds or payment policies, are inequitable and unethical. As I write my next law review article on the wild west of wellness, one of the big questions lingering out there is ..read more

Many people may not realize that some states have workplace wellness program laws; it’s not just the province of the federal government. Massachusetts happens to have one of the most comprehensive workplace wellness program laws, and it may just set the bar for other states to follow. Specifically, Massachusetts has a law that applies to Certified Group Purchasing Cooperative Wellness Programs (or entities that contract with such cooperatives). See 211 CMR 115.15. Read more here. The post Massachusetts’ Workplace Wellness Program Law May Set the Standard appeared first on Health,Corporate ..read more

Most of the conversation around workplace wellness compliance has focused on federal law compliance, such as with HIPAA, ACA, ADA, and GINA. But some states have also enacted laws that are important to workplace wellness program compliance. This blog post will highlight two state laws and examine whether more such laws are needed. New York New York Insurance Law § 3239 allows insurers, companies and municipal cooperative health benefits plans in New York to establish “wellness programs” in conjunction with group health insurance. The law defines “wellness programs” as those designed to “promot ..read more

On May 9, 2023, the IRS Office of Chief Counsel issued Memorandum #202323006 which clarified whether certain wellness incentive payments are subject to the Federal Insurance Contributions Act (FICA), Federal Unemployment Tax Act (FUTA) and federal income tax withholding (FITW), or collectively known as “employment taxes. The scenario described by the IRS is this: An employer provides comprehensive health benefits through a group health plan (GHP). The GHP provides preventive care benefits such as reimbursements for the cost of flu shots and other vaccinations, without any cost sharing (thanks ..read more

On April 17, 2020, Todd Maness (“Maness”), a police officer employed by the Village of Pinehurst in North Carolina, sued his employer for terminating his employment. Why was he terminated? According to Maness, the Village fired him because he refused to fill out a health risk assessment which was created by a wellness vendor, SiteMed. Maness claimed that his termination for refusing to answer questions about his and his family members’ health violated the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act (GINA), among other claims. Keep reading here. The p ..read more