Barney Cohen is a healthcare lawyer intimately familiar with the healthcare landscape. As a healthcare law insider, he brings to physicians and other medical professionals more than 30 years of experience as General and Senior Counsel with renowned healthcare organizations. His credentials include Senior Healthcare Law Counsel at the American Medical Association, Senior Vice President for Methodist Hospitals of Dallas, and General Counsel of Michael Reese Hospital & Medical Center.
Barney has served as an officer and board member of the Illinois Association of Healthcare Attorneys and a member of the American Health Lawyers Association, the Chicago Bar Association Health Law Committee, the Illinois State Bar Association Health Law Section, and the American Bar Association Healthcare Law Committee.
He knows healthcare law from both the physicians’ and hospitals’ perspectives. He has a 5-star rating with AVVO, along with the kind of references and success stories from medical professionals that a physician should look for when hiring a healthcare attorney.
As a member of senior leadership, Barney served as secretary to governing bodies and has overseen the legal, compliance, and risk management functions of academic healthcare systems. He has served as the primary legal advisor to individual and group practice physicians, healthcare system chief executive officers, senior management teams, governing bodies, and all of the constituent groups of healthcare systems.
Barney’s professional experience includes working as a mediator for the Illinois Association of Healthcare Attorneys, participating in the drafting of a Master Affiliation Agreement between a major academic hospital and a university, and the drafting of the asset sale of an academic hospital and HMO. He has been engaged by an Illinois-managed care entity with respect to contracting with hospitals and other providers, as well as the wind-down of business. He also served as counsel to a group of Relators in a Qui Tam False Claims Act lawsuit.
At the American Medical Association, Barney drafted a grant agreement for use in connection with one of its strategic initiatives – “Accelerating Change in Medical Education;” wrote an essential memorandum of understanding between the Liaison Committee for Medical Education, the Association of American Medical Colleges, and the American Medical Association; wrote learning modules for medical residents in the areas of conflicts-of-interest, fraud and abuse, and patient confidentiality; served as thought leader and editor of the American Medical Association Code of Medical Ethics modernization project, and a commentator on physician professional rights and responsibilities, and the patient-physician relationship.
Additional experience includes representing a major residency program in connection with program accreditation review and appeal, resolving academic affiliation issues, establishing university rules for governance and reorganizing academic faculty practice plans.
Barney also developed conflict-of-interest and financial conflict-of-interest in research policies, evaluated conflict-of-interest disclosures of board members and developed conflict-of-interest training programs.
In the area of clinical research, Barney developed a clinical research integrity and misconduct policy; set-up and served on institutional review boards, wrote patient consents, and reviewed human research protocols.
In connection with medical staff affairs, Barney has represented both hospitals and physicians in peer review matters, and has drafted a model for dispute resolution between the governing body and medical staff leadership.
In connection with HIPAA privacy and security, Barney authored privacy and security policies and procedures, as well as a HIPAA training program, business associate agreements, and notice of privacy practices, which was converted to online “flip-book” format for physicians. Barney served as the Privacy Officer of a professional trade association, including investigation and training/education, privacy incident investigations, and breach evaluation and reporting.
Barney matriculated from DePaul College of Law, Chicago, Illinois, and the University of Illinois, Chicago (with honors).
Barney’s LinkedIn profile, AVVO reviews and this website should help you determine if he is the right healthcare attorney for your needs. Anyone seeking personal, customized legal services will appreciate Barney’s fully focused concierge approach to the practice of healthcare law.
