Carolyn L. Coward

Carolyn Coward is a principal with The Van Winkle Law Firm, where she focuses her practice on regulatory and transactional healthcare and employment law for physicians and certain other healthcare providers. She regularly advises healthcare providers on compliance with HIPAA, the Anti-Kickback Statute, Stark Law regulating physician self-referrals, Anti-Markup Rule, Medicare/Medicaid reimbursement regulations and Wage and Hour laws.

Her clients include traditional physician medical practices, concierge medical practices, physicians associated with healthcare systems through employment or professional services arrangements, residents negotiating their first employment contract, physician practices negotiating the sale of their medical practices, and non-profit physician-led entities. Physician medical practice work includes drafting operating agreements, bylaws, shareholders’ agreements, and employment contracts including structuring bonus formulas, along with advising on leases and operating agreements for physician owned property interests. Representing physicians entering into relationships with healthcare systems involves ownership interests in ambulatory surgery centers, the sale of practice assets, and the negotiation of professional services and employment agreements, RVU rates and non-compete clauses. In some cases, physicians are selling and entering into relationships with entities backed by private equity where the negotiations involve the Corporate of Practice of Medicine doctrine, structure of the purchase price, and the usual employment terms but with a focus on provisions limiting early termination of the employment.

Other healthcare clients that Carolyn represents include: physical therapists, independent diagnostic testing facilities (IDTF), non-profit community-based healthcare entities, and mental health and substance abuse treatment counselors subject to 42 CFR Part 2 including residential and non-residential programs.

Carolyn’s professional highlights are included below.

Practice Areas

• Health Care
• Administrative & Regulatory Law
• Business Operations
• Employment & Workplace Law
• Business

Awards & Honors

• Lawyer of the Year in Healthcare Law, Asheville Area – The Best Lawyers in America® 2020, 2023, 2025
• Best Lawyers in America® 2016 – 2025

Practice Highlights

• Successfully negotiated professional services agreements between several medical practices and hospital systems with positive payment terms
• Negotiated favorable terms for the sale of several medical practices’ assets to healthcare systems, for-profit and non-profit entities, and private equity companies, including favorable terms for employment agreements
• Unwound a major medical practice from a business relationship and successfully negotiated terms without litigation or alternative dispute resolution and no interruption of practice business.
• Represented a physician practice in a reimbursement issue with Medicare in which the practice was allowed to retain $100,000 in contested fees.