Heather L. Fields

Heather L. Fields is a shareholder in the firm's Health Care Practice and chairs the firm's Hospitals and Health Care Systems group. She is also a member of the firm's Corporate Compliance and White Collar Litigation, Health Care Transactions, Hospice and Palliative Care group and the Tax-Exempt Organizations group. Heather routinely assists clients with a wide variety of regulatory, transactional, and compliance-related matters. She has extensive experience advising clients in connection with fraud and abuse issues that arise in the context of various health care provider relationships and transactions. Heather also deals regularly with patient safety and quality-of-care issues, peer review matters, medical staff issues, including investigations, correctives action, fair hearings, and drafting and review of medical staff bylaws and other governance documents. She advises clients on designing and implementing corporate compliance programs and assessing compliance program effectiveness, all aspects of HIPAA compliance and clinical research compliance. She also has served as interim associate general counsel on an in-house basis for extended periods for clients.

Heather has accumulated over 20 years of experience and understands the intricacies of the health care system, and works with her clients in determining practical solutions to complex issues. Her holistic approach offers her a complete understanding of the multiple sides to a particular issue in order to provide customized solutions and suggestions that take into account her client's specific needs, budgets, risk tolerance and ultimate goals. With her operational experience working in-house, Heather understands not only the legal side of the issue but appreciates the operational complexities and the daily pressures and challenges facing her clients.

Heather is certified in Healthcare Compliance (CHC) and is a Certified Compliance and Ethics Professional (CCEP).