In today’s video, we talk about laws governing nonsurgical medical cosmetic procedures.  Let’s break that down: these are procedures that are nonsurgical, so they don’t involve surgery.  Cosmetic, so they involve beauty rather than curing disease.  The procedures are nonsurgical and cosmetic, yet the law considers them “medical.” Sounds like a paradox.

Part of talking to lawyers and getting legal guidance from healthcare law firms is learning to break down the language of health care law.  When the law uses four nouns in a row, which I was taught never to do in my high school grammar class, like “nonsurgical medical cosmetic procedure,” your first reaction might be, “huh?” 

Or: “you talkin’ to me?”

Yes the law is talking to you.

Since one of the many professional experiences under my belt was working as a law professor at a law school, where I was teaching Legal Analysis, Research & Writing to first-year law students, I know how to break down statutes and regulations and do something that seems very simple, but actually takes a lot of concentration: read the law and make sense of it.

Because the law isn’t written in English, necessarily – that’s why we call a compilation of statutes, the Code.  As in, for example, the Code of Federal Regulations, also known as CFR; or, the Annotated Laws of Texas. These are codes, you have to read them like codes.

I’m Michael H. Cohen, founding attorney of the Cohen Healthcare Law Group. We’ve advised so many healthcare industry clients on healthcare and FDA legal issues.  These clients include medical spas and healthcare companies that work with stem cell therapies and regenerative medicine, as well as with nonsurgical cosmetic procedures in general. And we know how to read the law, interpret law, and figure out what the law actually means in English.

The big question here is one word, the word, “medical.”  So, when is the nonsurgical cosmetic procedure considered “medical”—which means it can be done only under supervision of a licensed medical doctor—and when is it NOT considered “medical” under the status of regulation?

The term “medical” is the key.

Again, we’re talking about law and the law isn’t always written in English although written by people who may be descended from Englishmen, I don’t know.  Not every state is going to talk about medical spa procedures in exactly these terms; but, it so happens that Texas, as an example, has passed a law that is in fact is called, Nonsurgical Medical Cosmetic Procedures.

We’ll talk more about that in the next video.

We look forward to speaking with you soon.