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Health Law

[01/30] Bernard v. City of Oakland
In a case in which retired firefighters or their surviving spouses contended that the City of Oakland and Union City were required to make additional payments toward their health care coverage pursuant to an amendment to the Public Employee Medical Hospital Care Act, the trial court's denial of mandamus relief and dismissal of the actions are affirmed, where: 1) it was appropriate to defer to the health care plan administrator's interpretation of the statutory language in dispute; 2) there was no error in allowing a witness to testify as an expert, and even if there was error, it was harmless; and 3) there was no merit to an assertion that a contracting agency that elects to make increasing contributions under Government code section 22892(c) must also comply with the minimum contribution provisions of 22892(b).

[01/27] Hutcherson v. Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System Administration
In a declaratory judgment action seeking a declaration that Arizona's Medicaid agency had no right at all to recover from an annuity purchased by a husband so that his institutionalized wife could obtain Medicaid coverage or, alternatively, had no right to recover for any costs incurred for the wife's care after the husband's death, the district court's grant of the defendant's motion for summary judgment is affirmed, where: 1) the federal Medicaid Act allows states to reach a deceased community spouse's annuity for costs incurred on behalf of an institutionalized spouse; and 2) nothing in the language of the Act was inconsistent with permitting the state agency to recover from the annuity expenses incurred after the husband's death.

[01/27] People v. Hughes
In a prosecution for several offenses involving marijuana, the judgment of conviction is affirmed, where it was not an abuse of discretion for the trial court to impose a condition of probation that prohibited the defendant from possessing marijuana, even for medical use.

[01/25] Walker v. Medtronic Inc.
In a suit alleging common-law tort claims arising out of the alleged failure of a medical device to operate in accordance with the terms of its premarket approval, the district court's grant of the defendant's motion for summary judgment is affirmed, where the device was undisputedly designed, manufactured, and distributed in compliance with its FDA premarket approval, and the plaintiff's common-law claims exceeded or differed from, rather than paralleled, federal requirements, so that each of her specific claims for negligence, strict liability, and breach of warranty was preempted by the federal Medical Device Amendments of 1976 to the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act.

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