Healthcare Credentialing and Privileging Expert Witnesses

Research & Planning Consultants, LP (RPC) has been assisting clients with expert services for over 45 years, including consulting and expert witness testimony for personal injury, healthcare litigation, commercial litigation and Certificate of Need matters. RPC also offers a wide selection of health data. They have served clients across the U.S, from Alaska to Florida and from New England to California. 

A Complete Team of Damages Experts for Personal Injury Litigation

Research & Planning Consultants, LP provides the following services: 

• PERSONAL INJURY - RPC provides comprehensive damages analysis in personal injury litigation. Their expert team has life care planners, vocational evaluators, board-certified physicians, economists and neuropsychologists. 

Areas of Expertise include: Life Care Plans, Loss of Earning Capacity or Support, Present Value of Damages, Medical Bill Analysis, Chargemaster Analysis, Neuropsychological Testing & Traumatic Brain Injury, Vocational Evaluations, IMEs, Section 18.001, Prestanding ED Chargemaster Analysis

• COMMERCIAL LITIGATION- RPC has provided expert analysis on commercial litigation concerning many industries: chemicals, refining, forestry, waste management, pipelines, water resources, oil and gas EDP, fisheries, agriculture, electrical generating plants, transmission lines, telecommunications, and real estate development. Our special expertise in the healthcare industry has proven valuable to business litigators unfamiliar with this complex industry.

Areas of Expertise: Breach of Contract / Commercial Economic Damages, Construction Disputes, Litigation over Non-Competitive Agreements, Environmental Torts and Toxic Torts, Commercial Disparagement, Wrongful Termination

• HEALTHCARE LITIGATION - RPC offers economic, statistical, data and clinical analysis in a wide range of healthcare litigation. They have experience with payment disputes, qui tam litigation, physician-hospital disputes, practice valuations and construction litigation. 

Areas of Expertise: Qui Tam Healthcare Litigation, Medical Staff Disputes, Professional Liability, Payment Disputes, Health Facility Construction Disputes, Freestanding ED Chargemester Analysis

• CERTIFICATE OF NEED - RPC provides Certificate of Need (CON) planning services nationwide. We have over 35 years of experience developing regulatory strategy, preparing applications and testifying in public and administrative hearings.

Areas of Expertise: Satellite Hospitals, New Hospitals, Relocation and Transfer of Beds, Observation Beds, Geriatric Psychiatric Units, Children’s Hospitals, Comprehensive Inpatient Rehabilitation Units, Neonatal Intensive Care Units, Open Heart Surgery Services, Long Term Acute Care Units, Projects that exceed CON Capital Threshold Limits, Projects for Specifically Listed Services, Programs Requiring CON, Hospices, Senior Living Facilities

Ronald T. Luke, JD, PhD, is a principal consultant and President of RPC, LP. Ron joined RPC in 1976 and became its president and principal owner in 1979. He has consulted on projects for health care providers, managed care plans and public agencies in more than 25 states. He also serves as an expert witness in trials, administrative proceedings and legislative hearings.

Active in the Health Policy Arena, Dr. Luke has been accepted as an expert in Economics, Socioeconomic Impact Analysis, and Policy Analysis by state and federal courts, and state administrative agencies. The types of cases in which he has provided expert testimony include personal injury, contractual disputes, health care payment disputes, construction defects, utility construction permitting, and certificate of need. He has testified on health care matters including market structure, billing fraud and abuse, reasonableness of charges, medical staff credentialing, workers’ compensation fee guidelines, utilization review, physician contracts, and managed care contracts.

Kacy L. Turner, MS, CRC, CVE, CLCP, is a Certified Life Care Planner and Vocational Consultant with RPC. She has over 20 years of experience in Rehabilitation. Ms. Turner has experience writing life care plans for both plaintiff and defense clients. She has experience as a rehabilitation consultant in three states and has been qualified as a testifying expert in state and federal court.  

Ms. Turner has worked on cases in several states as well as the country of Trinidad. To determine the pre-injury and post-injury employability in personal injury cases, she provides vocational testing, transferable skills analysis, job requirements analysis, rehabilitation plans, and definition of reasonable accommodations under the American with Disabilities Act. She is a member of the International Association of Rehabilitation Professionals, the Texas Association of Rehabilitation Professionals and Providers of Services, and Vocational Evaluation and Career Assessment Professionals.

Brian Piper, PhD,  is an Economist with RPC specializing in Quantitative Analysis and Modelling. He works on a variety of cases including personal injury and certificate of need. He is experienced in data extraction, management, simulation, and analysis using STATA, SQL, ARC GIS and a variety of other programs. Dr. Piper has taught graduate classes in statistics and econometrics in both MBA and Ph.D. programs.

Dr. Piper is an experienced expert, providing testimony, reports, and affidavits on the issues of economic damages in personal injury litigation, healthcare litigation, False Claims Act litigation, and other commercial litigation. He has testified on behalf of plaintiffs and defendants. 

Dr. Piper specializes in the economics of healthcare. He has been retained by healthcare providers and insurers in payment disputes. He has analyzed the reasonableness of charges and expected payment for past and future medical services for providers, insurers, plaintiffs, and defendants. Besides work in litigation, Dr. Piper has provided analysis of Certificate of Need applications and the economic impacts of proposed legislation.

Health Law Network (HLN) brings together the range of special talent needed to address most cases involving concerns about the reasonableness of medical billing charges, proper reimbursement, adequacy of clinical documentation, insurance disputes, accuracy of coding and quality of care, as well as allegations of false claims, Medicare or Medicaid fraud, antitrust violations and more.

HLN's mission is to assist attorneys and those involved in the healthcare industry in their search for experienced professionals qualified to serve as Independent Investigators, Compliance Consultants, Expert Witnesses, or Litigation Support Professionals

Litigation Support - HLN's experts have provided expert testimony in administrative and regulatory proceedings, as well as in state and federal courts for civil and criminal cases, for plaintiffs and defendants. HLN offers Peer-reviewed methodologies and Appellate court proven testimony by experienced professionals who have provided consulting services and conducted audits and investigations for hundreds of hospitals, physicians, and other healthcare providers nationwide.

HLN's Consultants: Certified Coding Specialists (CCS and CCS-P); Certified Financial Forensics (CFF); Certified in Healthcare Compliance (CHC); Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE); Certified Healthcare Chart Auditor (CHCA); Certified Professional Coder (CPC and CPC-H); Financial Analysts; Statisticians, See Full List.

L. Lamar Blount, CPA - During 30+ years in serving the healthcare industry, Lamar has provided consulting services for hundreds of clients in over 40 states. Lamar co-authored two editions of books on Billing and Reimbursement for the AMA. 

Lamar has served as an expert in over 300 cases and has been admitted in multiple US District Courts, State Courts and Administrative Hearings. He has testified for and served plaintiffs and defendants, as well as for providers, payors and government clients. He is the president of HLN and provides quality reviews on all of our expert reports. 

Prior to creating Health Law Network in 2003, Lamar was founder and chairman of Healthcare Management Advisors (HMA) from 1990 to 2002. HMA provided compliance, reimbursement, coding, managed care, clinical data and financial management expertise to over 1,600 hospitals and hundreds of other healthcare providers nationwide and internationally. He sold his equity interest in HMA privately in 2002. 

From 1981 to 1990, he was a co-founder and the Audit and Healthcare Consulting Partner for Hyatt, Imler, Ott & Blount (HIOB), which became the 10th largest CPA firm in Atlanta. Lamar was also President of HOSPLAN Micro Systems (an affiliate), which developed and marketed microcomputer-based software for medical records, budgeting, and rate setting to over 600 hospitals nationwide. 3M Health Information Systems purchased HIOB & HOSPLAN.

From 1974 to 1981, Lamar was with the international Big-8 CPA firm of Ernst & Young, where he became a Manager, supervising healthcare audits, Medicare & Medicaid cost reports, rate-setting projects, and financial feasibility studies.

Timothy N. Henry, CPA is Vice President of Consulting Services, managing our team of multi-disciplinary consultants. He has served as a consulting or testifying expert on 200+ cases for Health Law Network since 2012, representing plaintiffs and defendants in Medical Billing and Reimbursement Disputes in multiple U.S. district and State Courts. He has also served in cases involving Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement issues, Medicare fraud, managed care contract payment disputes, life care plan projections, and lost profit and economic damage claims.

Since 1978, Tim has served the healthcare industry as an auditor, consultant, and financial executive. He has served multiple hospitals and multi-provider healthcare systems as Chief Accountant, Internal Auditor, Vice President for Finance, and Chief Financial Officer. These hospitals and healthcare systems included Emory University/Emory Healthcare System, Gwinnett Hospital System, Wesley Woods Center, and Union General Health System. Tim's healthcare provider experience includes responsibility for financial statements, managed care contracts, and the business office, including the chargemaster, facility and professional fee billing, and collections. 

Prior to HLN, Tim worked with founder Lamar Blount in two other healthcare businesses. Tim was a Healthcare Audit Partner at Hyatt, Imler, Ott & Blount (HIOB), which became the 10th largest CPA firm in Atlanta; and he was Vice President of Compliance Services at Healthcare Management Advisors (HMA), Alpharetta, Georgia, which served more than 1,500 hospitals and hundreds of other healthcare providers and organizations nationwide. At HMA, Tim served as the Compliance Officer for multi-campus healthcare providers and directed the firm’s Medicare and Medicaid risk assessment and compliance program engagements.

Tony W. Ulbrandt, MAcc, CFE, is HLN’s Executive Vice President and helps set the firm’s strategic direction. Tony previously served as a Consulting Manager with HLN and has served as a consulting or testifying expert on 200+ cases for Health Law Network since 2013, serving plaintiffs and defendants in medical billing and reimbursement disputes in multiple US District and State Courts. He has also served in cases involving medical malpractice, healthcare fraud, Medicare fraud, Qui Tam lawsuits, criminal sentencing hearings, and lost profit and economic damage claims.

Before HLN, Tony served as a Forensic Accountant with Assurance Forensic Accounting CPAs, where he worked on multiple cases calculating economic damages involving retail/wholesale, manufacturing, food processing, real estate, restaurants, tourism, professional/consulting firms, distribution, and construction. He was also a Senior Accountant with Credo Financial Services, where he performed business valuations and worked on litigation support cases, including lost profit analysis and forensic reconstruction of financial statements. Tony also served as Senior Forensic Accountant at DDS Financial, where he performed on-site forensic analyses and audits. Tony passed the Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE) exam in 2017 and obtained a BBA in Economics from the University of Georgia and a Master of Accounting from Florida Atlantic University.

View Health Law Network's Consulting Profile.

Dennis E. Coleman, JD, MPH, has over 40 years of experience in Hospital and Healthcare Management. In 1990, he formed his own hospital administration / healthcare management services consulting firm provide healthcare management services to various healthcare provider clients in a variety of areas, including strategic planning, business development, operations management, sales and marketing, policy & procedure development, and human resources management.

Mr. Coleman's academic background includes a Juris Doctor degree from Southwestern University in Los Angeles and a Masters in Public Health degree with a Hospital Administration major and a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science, both from the University of California, Los Angeles.

Litigation Support - As a hospital administration expert witness consultant, Mr. Coleman is an advocate for applying community standards which are relevant, based upon the time frame, subject matter and administrative practice(s) appropriate to each case. He has consulted and provided case review, expert witness services, and/or strategic litigation preparation services in more than 200 legal matters. He accepts cases on behalf of Plaintiffs or Defendants.

Mr. Coleman is willing to serve as either a work product consultant or a designated expert based upon the particular strategic litigation needs of each case.

Cases Include:

• Medical Staff Credentialing & Clinical Privileging / ELAM
• Negligent Credentialing, Negligent Supervision, Negligent Retention
• Hospital / Physician Relations-MEJIA Ostensible Agency Issues
• Administrative Community Standards
• Medical Staff Bylaws, Rules & Regulations
• Provider-Based Physician Contracting Negotiations & Contract Administration
• Administrative Policies & Procedures
• Hospital Joint Commission Accreditation, Licensing & Regulatory Compliance Issues
• Wrongful Termination / Constructive Discharge / Whistleblower Issues
• Patient rights; Informed Consent
• Patient Safety; Environment of Care
• Governance; Corporate Negligence

View Dennis Coleman's Consulting Profile.

Dr. Keith Chamberlin is an award-winning Anesthesiologist in active clinical practice. Georgetown educated, he is a former Dartmouth Faculty member and current Fellow of the American Society of Anesthesiologists. He is a former Hospital Chief of Staff and Decorated United States Army veteran.

Litigation Support - Dr. Chamberlin is available to serve as an expert witness on cases involving anesthesiology standard of care and causation.  He also has significant medical management experience, having served as the CEO of multiple medical groups and an accountable care organization (ACO). As such, he is also available to serve as an expert witness on cases involving physician credentialling, provider agreements, physician employment contracts, healthcare billing and fraud, safety, quality, etc.

Dr. Chamberlin offers expert witness services to attorneys representing plaintiff and defense. He is an experienced expert witness at both deposition and trial. His services include medical record review, thorough reporting, deposition, and testimony as needed.

Areas of Expertise:

Intubation Central Line Difficult Airway Anesthesia Positioning Capnography Pre-operative Anesthesia Ambulatory Surgery Laryngospasm Propofol PACU Nurse Anesthetist

Recovery Room Hospital Administration Safety Quality Medical Billing Local Anesthetic Systemic Toxicity LAST Healthcare Fraud Credentialing Healthcare Provider Agreement ACO Physician Employment Contract