Physician Advocacy Liaison Committee

In 2006, the PAI was formed pursuant to the settlements from multidistrict litigation (“MDL”) against major for-profit health insurers, with nineteen state and county medical associations as signatory plaintiffs. At that time, this Committee was established as the PAI “Compliance Committee” and was charged with overseeing efforts to enforce the terms of the MDL settlements. Upon expiration of the MDL settlements, the Committee was renamed the “Physicians Advocacy Liaison Committee,”(“PALC”) and was charged with the broader role of working to address contracting and payment abuses by health plans and other entities. The PALC assists the PAI Board in the development and implementation of the Board’s strategic plan and is instrumental to the PAI’s work.

PAI PALC Members

• Rocky Wilcox, JD (rocky.wilcox@texmed.org)
  Chair, PAI PALC
  Vice President and General Counsel
  Texas Medical Association

• Conor Brockett, JD (cbrockett@ncmedsoc.org)
  Vice Chair, PAI PALC and Chair, Subcommittee on Fair Contracting and Payment
  Associate General Counsel
  North Carolina Medical Society

• Layne Gakos, Esq. (lgakos@csms.org)
  Secretary, PAI PALC and Chair, Health Insurance Exchange Subcommittee
  General Counsel
  Connecticut State Medical Society

• Yarnell Beatty (Yarnell.Beatty@tnmed.org)
  Chair, PAI PALC Subcommittee on Fair Medical Audits
  Vice President, Advocacy and General Counsel
  Tennessee Medical Association

• Francisco Silva, JD (fsilva@cmanet.org)
  Vice President and General Counsel
  California Medical Association

• Larry Downs, Esq. (ldowns@msnj.org)
  Chief Executive Officer
  Medical Society of New Jersey

• JC Nicholson, JD (jcnicholson@scmedical.org)
  General Counsel
  South Carolina Medical Association