#ItsMyLane: Legal & Medical Ethics When Doctors Speak Out on Public Policy

From LinkedIn Profile 
As an accomplished attorney and C-suite partner, I position myself as a strategic and legal resources to businesses, senior leaders, and BODs with success across compliance, operations, business planning, and private equity funding. I remain adaptive and agile to the evolving needs of growing businesses while delivering sound legal expertise and actionable solutions.

My early legal career spanned prosecution and litigation, which still delivers tremendous impact and skills to my current professional pursuits. Often sought out by the Board of Directors, I swiftly champion legal and operational strategies, support forward initiatives, and define needed compliance programs. I am action-oriented and often the missing piece of the puzzle to businesses in the Telehealth/Telemedicine/Digital Health space.

As Outside Legal Counsel, I supported MedAware Solutions as an Advisory Board Member and Chief Compliance Officer before transitioning into the position of full-time Chief Operations Officer. Upon taking the role, I evaluated and advised on sales strategies, the regulatory environment, and future business planning. From here, I entered my role as full-time Chief Legal & Compliance Officer for Forefront Telecare, Inc. From day one, I have implemented sound compliance programs, found legal solutions to complex problems, secured private equity funding, devised forward strategies, and overhauled training practices.

Regardless of the role I hold, I pride myself on my ethical practices, engaging leadership, and polished persona. I work endlessly to support those around me and feel that my true differentiator is my unmatched dedication. Never turning away from a challenging problem, I assert myself as a leader and subject matter expert in all that I do.

Mr. Horton's primary focus is on the representation of healthcare providers, financial services organizations, and other business enterprises in the areas of mergers, acquisitions and joint ventures, securities and corporate finance law, regulatory compliance, and corporate governance matters.

Prior to joining Jones Walker, Mr. Horton was a practice group leader at two other Birmingham-based law firms and served as general counsel of one of the nation’s largest publicly traded healthcare providers. He currently serves as head of the firm's Birmingham office.

With substantial experience both in private practice and as senior legal officer for a large public company, Mr. Horton has been involved in complex corporate finance and acquisition transactions in almost all sectors of the healthcare services industry. His background includes representation of issuers in securities offerings and periodic reporting, representation of borrowers in complex financing transactions, counseling health care providers on regulatory compliance, and representation of health care enterprises, financial services businesses, and other business clients in corporate governance matters, acquisition and divestiture transactions, joint ventures, venture investments, and other business transactions. He also has extensive experience in government and internal investigations. In addition, Mr. Horton is a certified mediator for the American Health Lawyers Association Dispute Resolution Service and regularly serves as a hearing officer for medical staff peer review hearings.

A nationally recognized speaker and author on healthcare, corporate and securities law, and professional responsibility topics, Mr. Horton has held leadership positions for several years with both the American Bar Association’s Health Law Section, where he served as the Section's 2015-2016 Chair, and the American Health Lawyers Association, where he served from 2011 to 2014 as Chair of the Business Law & Governance Practice Group and currently serves as a member of the AHLA Dispute Resolution Council. He is a contributing author to Health Care Fraud and Abuse: Practical Perspectives, to the 2015 edition of Health Law and Compliance Update, to Bloomberg BNA Health Care Program Compliance Guide and to multiple editions of Health Law Handbook, and his articles have appeared in The Business Lawyer, Journal of Health & Life Sciences Law, BNA’s Corporate Accountability Report, BNA’s Health Law Reporter and other publications. He also serves as Editor-in-Chief of AHLA’s Federal Healthcare Laws & Regulations. In 2016, he was honored by the AHLA Fraud and Abuse Practice Group with the Patricia Meador Leadership Award.

In addition, Mr. Horton serves as an adjunct professor at the University of Alabama School of Law and as a clinical associate professor at the School of Optometry at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. He has also served as a faculty panelist for George Washington University's Graduate Certificate in Healthcare Corporate Compliance Program since its inception in 2005.