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VA Consolidates Fraud Detection, Prevention, and Enforcement Efforts

Client Alert | 1 min read | 06.08.17

Continuing the Trump Administration’s focus on fraud, waste, and abuse, Veterans Affairs Secretary Dr. David Shulkin announced a program to consolidate fraud detection, prevention, and remediation efforts in VA administered programs. The program, called Seek to Prevent Fraud, Waste, and Abuse (STOP FWA), consolidates fraud prevention and remediation efforts within VA health, benefits, and cemeteries programs and is expected to partner with other federal agencies to leverage best practice in fraud prevention, detection, and enforcement. Information sharing among fraud detection and remediation programs has accelerated in recent years across the government, and contractors are well served to consider a holistic approach to investigating (and, if needed, disclosing) misconduct because it is increasingly likely that multiple government stakeholders will be interested in the outcome.

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Client Alert | 2 min read | 11.14.25

Defining Claim Terms by Implication: Lexicography Lessons from Aortic Innovations LLC v. Edwards Lifesciences Corporation

Claim construction is a key stage of most patent litigations, where the court must decide the meaning of any disputed terms in the patent claims.  Generally, claim terms are given their plain and ordinary meaning except under two circumstances: (1) when the patentee acts as its own lexicographer and sets out a definition for the term; and (2) when the patentee disavows the full scope of the term either in the specification or during prosecution.  Thorner v. Sony Comput. Ent. Am. LLC, 669 F.3d 1362, 1365 (Fed. Cir. 2012).  The Federal Circuit’s recent decision in Aortic Innovations LLC v. Edwards Lifesciences Corp. highlights that patentees can act as their own lexicographers through consistent, interchangeable usage of terms across the specification, effectively defining terms by implication....