Trusted Legal Counsel
in Healthcare & Business Law

With over fifty years of combined legal experience, Schuller | Morris delivers a broad range of legal solutions for both healthcare professionals and business leaders. Whether providing transactional and regulatory advice or serving as outside general counsel, we help our clients achieve their business goals.

Our Team

Karen Duke Schuller

Partner

Karen Duke Schuller is a highly accomplished attorney with four decades of experience practicing in the health law field, including serving as General Counsel for several prominent healthcare organizations.

As Vice President and General Counsel for St. Mary’s Health Care System, Karen advised the board of directors, CEO, and senior leadership on governance, business and regulatory compliance matters. Among her other accomplishments, Karen is proud to have played a collaborative role in establishing the first internal medicine graduate medical education program at St. Mary’s.

Throughout Karen’s career, she has drafted and negotiated a variety of physician agreements, including recruitment, employment, affiliation, acquisition, medical directorship, management services and hospital-based specialty contracts. She has also handled medical staff, peer review, credentialing and bylaws matters with precision.

Karen has provided thought leadership through guest lectures at the University of Georgia School of Law and other presentations, reinforcing her enthusiasm for investing in the next generation of healthcare professionals.

Before her role at St. Mary’s, Karen served as the first General Counsel for The Emory Clinic and for PROMINA Health System, where she established comprehensive legal and compliance frameworks. Her early career as an associate at Alston & Bird equipped her with foundational experience in corporate law and healthcare transactions as well as an introduction into franchising, banking and captive insurance company endeavors.

Karen earned her Juris Doctor from Wake Forest University School of Law in 1984, where she served as Editor of the Law Review, and gained her Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from the University of Georgia in 1981, graduating with honors.

When not practicing law, Karen enjoys studying the Bible, mentoring young women, spending time with her family, and engaging in all types of board and card games. Her integrity, conscientiousness, and dedication to excellence in all she does, combined with her legal acumen, makes her a trusted partner and wise counselor in the healthcare field.

Cash V. Morris

Partner

Cash Morris is an experienced attorney with over 15 years of advising individuals and organizations across both the healthcare and business sectors. As a trusted counselor, he has worked closely with healthcare providers, corporate boards, and business leaders to ensure operational excellence, regulatory compliance, and growth in complex and highly regulated environments.

In his healthcare practice, Cash has managed the day-to-day legal needs of a regional health system. His work has encompassed the structuring of provider and payor agreements, acquisitions, medical staff governance, regulatory compliance, patient care issues, risk, business operations, and corporate governance. His contributions and oversight mitigated risk, enhanced efficiency, and fostered growth across multiple facilities and service lines.

Complementing his healthcare expertise, Cash also advises business enterprises on formation, governance, and operations. His guidance spans acquisitions, affiliations, and mergers & acquisitions, ensuring that both healthcare and non-healthcare clients are well positioned to capitalize on opportunities and navigate evolving legal landscapes.

In addition to his advisory work, Cash brings robust litigation and intellectual property experience to his practice. He has represented clients in state and federal courts on matters ranging from medical malpractice and commercial disputes to intellectual property and tort litigation. This breadth of experience allows him to advocate effectively across a spectrum of legal challenges, offering a level of expertise that is rare in the intersection of healthcare and business law.

Known for his collaborative, results-driven approach, Cash provides high-quality legal services that protect his clients’ interests, enhance their operations, and position them for long-term success.

Cash is been admitted to practice law in Georgia and New York. He earned his Juris Doctor from Georgia State University College of Law in June 2007 and graduated with honors from the Georgia Institute of Technology in May 2003, earning a Bachelor of Science in Economics with an academic concentration in Computer Science.

Our Areas of Focus

01.

Regulatory Compliance

Our team is skilled at navigating a complex regulatory landscape across both healthcare and broader business sectors. For healthcare clients, we provide expert guidance on the Anti-Kickback Statute, Stark Law, the False Claims Act, HIPAA, state Certificate of Need (CON) rules, and Medicare and Medicaid regulations. We support internal reviews and corporate compliance programs. For business enterprises, we also offer strategic counsel to ensure adherence to applicable regulatory standards to minimize risks.

02.

Business Strategies

We provide legal services to healthcare and business professionals, offering support in formation, governance, and daily operations. We advise clients on mergers, acquisitions, and affiliations, providing strategic guidance to navigate complex decisions with confidence. Whether you’re launching a new practice or business, restructuring an existing entity, or expanding service lines, we collaborate with you to develop business models that drive efficiency, productivity, and sustainable growth.

03.

Contracting

Our attorneys have extensive experience drafting and negotiating a wide range of contracts. For healthcare clients, we handle physician recruitment and employment agreements, medical director contracts, management services arrangements, hospital-based specialty contracts, and value-based care agreements. For business enterprises, we prepare NDAs, service contracts, purchase and sale agreements, leases, licenses, and other commercial arrangements tailored to their needs.

Legal Counsel for Providers Exploring New Ways to Deliver Care

The way healthcare is delivered is changing faster than the legal framework around it. Physicians and advanced providers are building practices that do not depend on insurance reimbursement, contracting directly with patients and employers, offering wellness and elective services, and using telehealth and technology to reach patients in new ways. Schuller | Morris works with providers who are evaluating, launching, or transitioning to these alternative models, including direct primary care, self-pay, and hybrid practices; telehealth-first offerings; and wellness practices. We start with a practical question: how do you want your practice to work?

Practice Structure and Regulatory Guidance

We advise clients on selecting and structuring a practice model and navigating the laws that apply to it. Depending on the model, this may include ownership and control, professional licensure, scope of practice, physician supervision and delegation, governmental healthcare program participation, fee arrangements, and the relationship among affiliated entities.

Patient Agreements and Documentation

Practices built on these models need careful documentation of patient consent, payment terms, and service limitations, both to satisfy the rules that apply and to reduce exposure to government, payer, and patient claims. That is true of membership agreements, cash-pay fee agreements, telehealth consents, and the clinical intake forms. The regulatory and operational issues are heightened when a practice continues to bill insurance or governmental programs. We provide experienced counsel to navigate these issues and prepare appropriate documentation to address these concerns.

Technology and Vendor Relationships

We advise providers on contracts and other legal issues involving technology and outside vendors, including EHR, telehealth, messaging, payment, and billing platforms, and any HIPAA business associate agreements those relationships require.

Ongoing Counsel

A practice's needs do not end at launch. We continue to advise providers as their practices grow, add services, change technology or vendors, respond to legal developments, and encounter new operational issues.

New Models of Healthcare Delivery

Considering a New Practice Model?

Whether you are planning a new practice, transitioning an existing one, or reviewing an established model, we would be glad to talk with you about your plans and the legal issues involved.

196 Alps Road, Suite 70

Athens, GA 30606

706-850-0986

Trusted Legal Counsel in Healthcare & Business Law