Alumni in Practice

Practicing Alumni in Health Law

Creighton’s law school has a number of accomplished alumni practicing health law. Those featured below are open to students currently working towards a health law concentration to reach out to them via email for advice.

Molly Carmody, JD’15

Legislative Affairs Specialist, Sanford Health Plan
molly.carmody@sanfordhealth.org
Areas of expertise: Government relations, healthcare reform from the insurance side, Medicaid expansion, managed care and Medicare Supplement/Select
Advice to students: Utilize Creighton’s Externship program. It was an excellent opportunity to understand how we, as lawyers, can utilize our skills within healthcare organizations.”

Darrell Klein, JD’82

Attorney III for Nebraska’s Department of Health and Human Services, Division of Public Health
darrell.klein@nebraska.gov
Areas of expertise: Public health law; including public health emergency law (bioterrorism and pandemic influenza response), health data privacy and prescription drug monitoring programs.
Advice to students: “The huge advantage of working in government, particularly public health, is everyone around you should be doing their best to help people and ‘do good.’ In private practice, you take your client as you find them, and usually you are addressing the problems ‘after the fact.’ While that is not totally absent in public health law practice, there is a significantly greater opportunity to help plan and address issues before there are any significant problems.”

Katelyn Lawrence, JD’18

Law Clerk at Legal Aid of Nebraska’s Health Education Law Project
klawrence@legalaidofnebraska.org
Areas of expertise: I’m a recent graduate, but as a student who received the health law concentration, I studied Medicaid and Medicare, social security, private health insurance, healthcare organizations and the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA).
Advice to students: “If you aren’t willing to commit to a whole semester-long externship, you should definitely consider volunteering. Hospitals, nonprofits, insurance companies will always be looking for help. Volunteering can lead to great references, a better understanding of healthcare law; and, at best, a job. Sometimes it can seem hard to find a job in healthcare law, but if you know what you want to do it is completely possible to create that job. I did it.”

Molly McCleery, JD’12

Deputy Director, Health Care Access Program, Nebraska Appleseed
mmccleery@neappleseed.org
Areas of expertise: Medicaid (including Medicaid expansion and managed care) and the Affordable Care Act
Advice to students: “If you are interesting in working in Medicaid policy, take administrative law. I use the things I learned in that class every single day in practice.”

Sean Nakamoto, JD’17

Associate Attorney, Health Law and Technology and Intellectual Property Law Sections at Baird Holm, LLP
snakamoto@bairdholm.com
Areas of expertise: I’m a new attorney, but my practice focuses on the intersection of health law and data privacy and security law.
Advice to students: “Get a mentor who practices in the area of health law that you’re interested in. Also, join the American Health Lawyers Association. As a law student, the membership is very affordable and you get access to excellent resources and publications and can participate in the AHLA’s mentor program.”