Mark E. Rust

The original chair of the firm’s national Healthcare industry practice, Mark practiced in or has written about law and healthcare in many publications, such as the Journal of the American Bar Association and USA Today, for more than 40 years. He was listed as a notable healthcare lawyer in Chambers USA, Top Healthcare Lawyers of Illinois, Illinois Super Lawyers and The Best Lawyers in America.

Mark represented hospitals, physician clinics, medical staffs, and managed care organizations, including provider-sponsored insurance companies and HMOs. Mark’s practice often involved the ongoing analysis of antitrust issues in healthcare; for Thomson Reuters Publishing he rewrote and for years updated the chapter on “Antitrust” for The Law of Medical Practice in Illinois, Fourth Edition. Mark also appeared before the U.S. Congress and several state legislatures providing testimony on healthcare delivery and managed care.

In addition to traditional federal and state healthcare regulation, Mark focused on the application of federal pre-emption to managed care arrangements. He and his firm appeared before the U.S. Supreme Court in Rush Prudential v. Moran, 536 U.S. 355 (2002), successfully arguing, for the first time, how the relationship between providers, patients, managed care and state regulation should work under the federal law known as ERISA. Mark was also Counsel of Record on behalf of the American Medical Association and 50 state medical societies on the same topic before the Supreme Court the following year in Kentucky v. Miller, 538 U.S. 329 (2003). In connection with his formation and representation of startup insurer Land of Lincoln Health, formed with funds under the Affordable Care Act, Mark and his firm fought, and beat, the United States government in a payment dispute ultimately resolved after briefing and argument in the U.S. Supreme Court (Maine Community Health Options; Monida Health; and Land of Lincoln Health v. United States, 590 U.S. _____((2020)), Slip Op. 18-1038).

Following college, Mark began his career as a journalist in Chicago reporting on the law for a local investigative journal, and moved on to become the national legal affairs reporter, and then business editor, for American Medical News (1983-1989), which led to his career as a healthcare lawyer. In his 35 years of active practice, Mark was a frequent invited guest and keynote speaker on healthcare law-related topics.