Full Biography: Christopher Scott Sears

Chris Sears concentrates his practice in the field of health care and employee benefits. He works with public and private employees including hospitals and educational institutions. Chris helps clients design employer-sponsored health plans and other benefits such as cafeteria plans, tuition reimbursement plans, long and short term disability plans, health reimbursement accounts, health savings accounts, and life insurance plans. He also helps them comply with the myriad of laws that regulate these plans such as the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA), the Internal Revenue Code, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), the Americans with Disability Act (ADA), the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), and the Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act (COBRA).

Chris also concentrates on laws regulating the privacy of health information. In particular, Chris works closely with both health plans and health care providers in their efforts to comply with the complex privacy rules of HIPAA, as well as state privacy laws. He works closely with the nationally-known regional health information sharing network, the Indianapolis Network for Patient Care, and other cross-institutional health data sharing networks. He was recently appointed as a Technical Advisor to the Steering Committee for the National Project of Best Practices for State-Level Regional Health Information Organizations, a study being conducted by the Foundation of Research and Education (FORE) of the American Health Information Management Association (AHIMA) under contract to the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC). In addition, Chris will be chairing the legal task force of Indiana's Health Information Security Privacy Collaboration (HISPC), funded by the National Governors Association

Chris also consults with clients to adopt, maintain, and terminate their employee pension and retirement plans in compliance with the Internal Revenue Code and ERISA. In doing so, he assists clients with their 401(k) plans, tax-sheltered annuities, non-qualified deferred compensation arrangements, and other qualified and non-qualified plans.

He is admitted to practice law in the State of Indiana.