Wednesday General Session - Top Employment Law Issues for Healthcare Employers

The quality of care provided by a healthcare organization is directly related to the health of its workforce. This presentation will cover some of the top employment law issues facing healthcare employers in 2025 (and beyond)
and provide tips for successfully navigating these issues to attract and retain top talent and avoid employment law pitfalls in the process. Topics covered will include: mindful documentation of care provider performance issues and related board reporting, medical staff, and malpractice
considerations, patient and employee confidentiality, employment policies for care delivery organizations, drug testing and managing employees on HPSP plans, provider employment agreements, independent contractor agreements, managing litigation and threatened litigation brought by care providers, important considerations for settling employment claims with care providers, and the latest Minnesota and federal employment law updates every employer should know about.

SESSION OBJECTIVES:

The participants will be able to:

• Educate attendees re important employment law issues impacting healthcare employers

• Provide tools and strategies to avoid legal liability associated with various state and federal employment laws

Jody Ward-Rannow

Of Counsel, Ogletree Deakins

Prior to re-joining Ogletree in 2021, Jody spent six years as in-house dispute resolution and employment counsel for an integrated health system. In this role, Jody provided strategic advice to all levels of company leaders, such as presidents and frontline supervisors on maintaining compliance with employment laws. During her time in-house, Jody also earned a Master’s in Public Health with a focus on health systems operations and health equity to provide even greater strategic advice to the business.

Back at Ogletree, Jody applies that same commitment to understanding her clients’ business in order to provide strong, strategic advice. On a daily basis, she uses her understanding of client needs and operations to provide immediate assistance that does not require in-house clients to do additional work before communicating internally.

Jody also zealously advocates for her clients in all aspects of dispute resolution, including attorney demand letters, charges of discrimination, arbitration, and litigation. Jody understands that her clients have a number of business factors determining their litigation strategy and partners with clients to obtain successful results that meet their business goals.

Substantively, Jody has extensive experience in many areas of employment law with a special focus on healthcare clients, including Physician/Provider employment contracts, Section 1557 compliance, HIPAA and state law patient/member privacy, and other niche issues impacting healthcare, health plan, and life sciences entities. She provides advice and defense on matters involving all types of discrimination and retaliation, the Family and Medical Leave Act, workers’ compensation retaliation claims, noncompete/nonsolicitation, and unfair competition claims, breach of contract claims, and whistleblower retaliation claims. Jody also advises regarding employment policy development and revisions and routinely conducts workplace investigations.

Cynthia Bremer

Shareholder, Ogletree Deakins

Cynthia Bremer is the former managing shareholder of the Minneapolis office. Cynthia is Co-Chair of the firm’s Healthcare Industry Group. She also is a member of the Steering Committee of the firm’s Workplace Investigations and Organizational Assessments Practice Group. Cynthia has extensive experience in employment law and complex litigation matters. While Cynthia’s primary focus has been employment litigation defense in federal and state courts throughout the Midwest, including class and collective actions, Cynthia also advises companies on employment law issues involving past and present employees. Further, Cynthia has litigated numerous restrictive covenants suits, including seeking and defending preliminary injunctions and merit proceedings. In addition to extensive litigation and advising experience in employment law, Cynthia’s experience also includes securities arbitrations, commercial and civil litigation, and intellectual property litigation.

Prior to entering private practice in Minnesota in 1999, Cynthia was in private practice in North Dakota.  While in North Dakota, Cynthia was also a Special Assistant Attorney General for the State of North Dakota and represented the State in dozens of administrative hearings and appeals.

Cynthia started her legal career as an Assistant Attorney General for the State of Missouri, assigned to the Complex Litigation group. Her cases as an Assistant Attorney General included jury and bench trials, petitions for certiorari to the U.S. Supreme Court on constitutional law issues, and key involvement in one of the largest civil RICO cases ever brought in Missouri. Cynthia was also appointed as a Special Assistant Attorney General for the prosecution of election law violations.

In addition to being very involved within the legal and business communities, Cynthia is a frequent seminar presenter, addressing a variety of human resource and employment law issues.