Health Law and Policy Forum Brown Bag Luncheons

Series Overview

This year, HLA introduced the Health Law and Policy Forum Brown Bag Luncheon Series (see photos) which brings together the best legal and health care minds in Massachusetts for informal discussions of hot topics in health law. Each event in the Series, a component of HLA’s Pro Bono Legal Network curriculum, features a special guest speaker who discusses a cutting edge issue of health law or policy and engages in a dialogue with the audience. The Series provides participants with valuable networking opportunities and the chance to exchange ideas on key health care topics with some of the most well-known, respected, and knowledgeable experts in the field.

In the first several months of the Series, special guest presenters and their topics have included:

• Michael Dukakis, Former Massachusetts Governor; Distinguished Professor, Department of Political Science, Northeastern University: Health Care: Getting Serious About Cost Control
• Scott Harshbarger, Proskauer Rose LLP, Senior Counsel to the Firm and Former Massachusetts Attorney General: The Brave New World of Non-Profit Governance: Legal and Ethical Challenges
• Clare McGorrian, noted health law litigator and Adjunct Professor, Suffolk University Law School; former Senior Staff Counsel, HLA: The Anatomy of a Class Action Trial: HCFA v. Romney
• Judith Kurland, former Regional Director of the United States Department of Health and Human Services and former Commissioner of Boston Department of Health and Hospitals, Chief of Staff to Boston Mayor Thomas Menino: Bait and Switch: Medicare Part D and Other Scams
• Honorable Margot Botsford, Associate Justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court: In the Matter of Hilary: On the Right to Counsel for Parents of Children in Need of Services
• Nick Littlefield, Partner and Chair of the Government Strategies Group at Foley Hoag LLP and former Staff Director and Chief Counsel for Senator Edward M. Kennedy, Chair, U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education and Labor: Lessons Learned from the Health Care Wars of the 90’s for 2009
• Patricia McGovern, General Counsel and Senior Vice President for Corporate and Community Affairs, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and former Massachusetts State Senator: Getting Serious About Quality Health Care: Costs and Benefits
• James Roosevelt, Jr., President and Chief Executive Officer, Tufts Health Plan, former Associate Commissioner, Social Security Administration: Addressing the Threat of Rising Health Care Costs to the Sustainability of Health Care Reform
• Dolores L. Mitchell, Executive Director, Group Insurance Commission of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and Board Member, Commonwealth Health Insurance Connector Authority: Health Reform: A Brave New World and Not for the Faint of Heart

Special Thanks

Health Law Advocates wishes to thank all our friends and supporters for making the HLA Health Law and Policy Forum: Brown Bag Luncheon series so successful. Your enthusiastic participation was key to the quality of our programs. We are taking a short break from programming for July and August, but will be back in September.

We wish to especially thank all the wonderful, thoughtful speakers who volunteered to share with us their perspectives and insights into the critical health care issues of the day.

Finally, a thank you to the wonderful staff at AARP Massachusetts for hosting many of our Brown Bag Luncheons in their lovely conference room.  Many thanks also to organizations providing funding for the activities of HLA's Pro Bono Legal Network, including the Luncheon Series: Blue Cross Blue Shield of Mass. Foundation, the Massachusetts Bar Foundation, the Boston Bar Foundation and Proskauer Rose LLP
 
Thank you to all!

Recent Events

Dolores L. Mitchell, Executive Director of the Group Insurance Commission of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and Board Member of the Commonwealth Health Insurance Connector Authority, led the discussion: "Health Reform: A Brave New World and Not for the Faint of Heart."