J. Peter Rich is a partner in the law firm of McDermott Will & Emery LLP and is based in the Firm’s Los Angeles office. He co-chairs the Firm’s Insurance / Payors Affinity Group.
Peter has practiced almost exclusively in the health law field for over 30 years, and routinely advises hospitals, health plans and other health insurers, medical groups, integrated systems, and other health industry clients, on a wide variety of transactions, health regulatory matters, hospital-medical staff matters and health industry disputes.
McDermott Will & Emery's health industry practice was named “Healthcare Team of the Year” by Chambers USA as part of the Chambers USA Awards for Excellence 2010. Peter has been specifically recognized for each of the past several years by Best Lawyers in America® in the categories of health law and administrative law, and by Super Lawyers® in the category of health care lawmost recently for 2012. He has also been recognized as one of the leading health care lawyers in the current Expert Guide to the Leading U.S. Healthcare Lawyers, and has for many years received the highest rating of “AV® Preeminent rating” for his legal ability and ethics from the independent Martindale-Hubbell attorney rating system.
Peter has formed and restructured many types of managed care organizations, including both Pioneer and Medicare Shares Savings Program Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs), other types of physician-hospital organizations and similar integrated health care delivery systems, as well as health maintenance organizations (HMOs) and other types of health plans. He has served as special health care counsel in several bankruptcies involving health plans, IPAs, and hospitals, and in that role has successfully advised on restructuring, regulatory compliance, and asset sales. He also advises hospitals and other affiliated providers as well as medical staffs in such legal areas as joint ventures and other transactions, medical staff bylaws and peer review matters, the corporate practice of medicine and fee-splitting, EMTALA, state licensing and CMS enforcement actions and other health regulatory matters. He has served for over a decade as outside general counsel to the board of directors of one of the nation’s largest and most successful physician-owned malpractice insurance cooperative interindemnity arrangements, and has also provided legal assistance in connection with the creation of risk-retention groups and other physician-owned captive professional liability insurance companies.
Peter speaks and writes frequently in the field. Some of Peter’s recent presentations include: “Accountable Care Organizations: Are There Workable Models?” for The Institute for Medical Leadership’s Chief of Staff Boot Camp on December 9, 2011; “Key Compliance Issues in Structuring and Operating ACOs” for the Los Angeles County Bar Association 8th Annual Healthcare Law Compliance Symposium on October 13, 2011; “Accountable Care Organizations: What Are They?” for the Physicians Insurance Association of America 2011 Medical Liability Conference on May 11 and 12, 2011; “Accountable Care Organizations: The Proposed ACO Regulations” for Strafford Publications, Inc. on April 27, 2011; “Accountable Care Organizations: Latest Developments” for Strafford Publications, Inc. on December 15, 2010; “Disruptive Physicians: From Credentialing to Disciplinary Action – Minimizing Liability for Poor Quality of Care, Negligent Credentialing and Physician Lawsuits” for Strafford Publications, Inc., on August 27, 2009; “Medical Staff Credentialing and Privileging” for The Institute for Medical Leadership’s 2008 to 2009 Medical Staff Boot Camps, “Disruptive Physicians” for the April 2009 California Medical Association Leadership Academy; and on “The Escalating Battle Over Payments to Non-Contract Providers: Latest Developments,” for the October 2008 annual meeting of the Healthcare Law Section of the Los Angeles County Bar Association (of which he is a past president).
Peter’s publications include “Eleventh Circuit Will Rule Soon on Constitutionality of Affordable Care Act” for BNA, Inc.’s Health Insurance Report (August 2011); “An Overview of Insurance Payment for Health Care Services and Employee Welfare Benefit Plans,” Chapter 14 of the Health Law Practice Guide (revised 2011); “Eleventh Circuit Will Rule Soon on Constitutionality of Affordable Care Act” for BNA, Inc.’s Health Insurance Report (August 2011); “Virginia Federal Court Strikes Down Individual Mandate: What’s Next for the Health Reform Law?” for BNA’s Health Law Reporter (December 2010), “CMS Seeks Comments on New Standards for ACOs’ AMA Adopts New Principles for ACOs” for the American Health Lawyers Association (November 2010), “The Potential Risk to Successful Hospital Integration Strategies Under the PPACA Posed by Physician Board Members’ Conflicts of Interest” for The Governance Institute E-Briefings (July 2010) and “Health Reform Hands Boards Big Responsibilities” (both co-authored with McDermott partner Michael Peregrine) for Trustee Magazine (May 2010); “Health Care Reform: ACOs and Developments in Coordinated Care Delivery, Shared Savings and Bundled Payments” (co-authored with McDermott partner Gary Davis) for McDermott, Will & Emery’s On the Subject (April 2010); the “California Supreme Court’s Prospect Medical Group Decision Prohibits Balance Billing by Emergency Services Providers in California” for the American Health Lawyers Association Practice Group Member Briefing (2009); “What Rates are Health Plans Legally Obligated to Pay Non-Contracted Providers?” for the ABA Health Care Litigation Newsletter (2006); “Tiered Benefit HMO Plans: The Next Generation of Managed Care Plans?” (2004), and “Recent Significant Federal and State Court Decisions and Statutes That Affect Managed Care Provider Contracting” (2003).
Education
- Harvard Law School, J.D., 1977
- University of California-Los Angeles, A.B. (summa cum laude), 1974
