Wellness Law Podcast

Host Barbara Zabawa welcomes Zara Northover—2008 Jamaican Olympic shot putter, entrepreneur, and advocate—who recounts her rise in the mortgage industry and how, amid COVID and post–George Floyd DEI tensions, her efforts to surface inequities and hiring concerns led to warnings from leadership and a racist “gorilla” birthday card allegedly sent by the former CEO and COO. Northover describes panic attacks, leave, HR pitfalls, difficulty finding the right counsel, rejecting a pressured settlement, and representing herself pro se since 2023, including a pending U.S. Supreme Court petition about whether “new harm” should be barred for failure to merge a first lawsuit lacking EEOC prerequisites. She also has a surviving federal wrongful-termination case. Northover shares her TEDx talk, book The Cost of Justice, and plans for a subscription-based “legal GPS” app to match users with attorneys and guide pro se deadlines and steps, plus her Moving in Faith clothing line at movinginfaith.com.

00:00 Welcome and Introductions
00:28 Meet Zara Northover
02:43 Lawsuit Origin Story
05:03 Retaliation and Gorilla Card
07:06 Navigating Lawyers and Going Pro Se
10:04 Supreme Court Petition Explained
12:24 Other Case and What’s Next
13:21 Book and Justice Aviators App
13:54 How the App Works
16:43 Workplace Wellness and HR Reality
18:27 What Resources Employees Need
26:51 Moving with Faith Brand
30:18 Final Thanks and Wrap Up

Learn more about Wellness Law at www.wellnesslaw.com. 

Host Barbara Zabawa welcomes Steven Paskoff, CEO and founder of Employment Learning Innovations (ELI) and former EEOC attorney, to discuss his book Civility Rules and his work helping organizations build lawful, productive, and civil workplaces. Paskoff explains how he left legal practice to create interactive, experiential training that addresses not only illegal discrimination and harassment but also the broader “beneath the surface” behaviors—bullying, abusive, unjust, unwelcoming, and rude conduct—that can cause serious harm and escalate into illegality. He describes the “viral spread” of uncivil behavior from disruptive leaders to staff and ultimately to customers and the public, emphasizing major wellness, safety, and quality impacts, especially in healthcare. Through hospital examples involving disruptive surgeons and patient harm, he argues senior leadership must set clear expectations, sustain commitment, and require behavior change. Purchase Stephen's book, Civility Rules, here.

00:00 Stephen M. Paskoff: Wellness Law Podcast
03:06 Civility Rules & the Iceberg
09:54 The Surgeon Story
13:31 The Surgical Safety Analogy
17:11 Where to Learn More

Learn more about Wellness Law at www.wellnesslaw.com. 

Host Barbara Zabawa interviews naturopath and All Better Health/All Better Naturopathy CEO and former White House policy advisor Katie Talento about disrupting healthcare financing and benefits. Talento explains a lawsuit involving Patient Rights Advocate challenging the American Medical Association’s control and monetization of CPT billing codes, arguing codes required by law for Medicare, HIPAA compliance, Medicaid, employer claims, and federal price-transparency rules should not be copyrighted. She then describes All Better Health’s work helping employers replace traditional carrier and pharmacy benefit manager arrangements with independent, transparent vendors and fiduciary-minded contracts, while improving benefits through concierge/advanced primary care, nurse navigation, quality steering, and incentives like waived cost-sharing. They discuss “corporate wellness 2.0” centered on coordinated primary care and scalable direct primary care billed as claims, and a “wellness 3.0” vision incorporating functional care and holistic services. Connect with Katy here.

00:00 Welcome and Guest Intro
01:09 AMA CPT Codes Lawsuit
02:36 Why CPT Codes Matter
03:54 Patient Rights Advocate Fight
07:27 All Better Health Mission
09:41 Firing Carriers and PBMs
11:25 Better Benefits Through DPC
13:33 Corporate Wellness 2.0
15:16 Scaling Direct Primary Care
20:50 Wellness 3.0 and Wrap Up
21:42 Where to Connect
22:17 Podcast Closing

Learn more about Wellness Law at www.wellnesslaw.com. 

Host Barbara Zabawa welcomes Dr. Rosie Ward, CEO and founder of Salveo Partners and author of Future-Proofing Leadership and How to Build a Thriving Culture at Work, to discuss her “thriving organization” pyramid, which places 21st-century organizational design and leadership/culture as the foundation and wellbeing programs at the apex. Ward explains her shift from traditional worksite wellness after concluding many programs and ROI claims were ineffective or based on flawed data, and argues organizations often “program” their way out of deeper issues like poor management, lack of mattering, and weak accountability. They discuss how embedding wellbeing into culture and employee experience can improve sustainability and reduce legal risk, including an example where a client’s culture and leadership investments helped in a government legal case. Ward also addresses the Affordable Care Act’s role in boosting but narrowing wellness into incentives-driven “wellness or else.”

00:00 Welcome and Introductions
01:06 The Thriving Organization Pyramid
02:01 From Wellness to Leadership
04:24 Culture Beats Programs
06:29 Legal Risk Reduction Story
08:44 Conference Demand and First Book
11:19 Did the ACA Help Wellness
14:00 Mattering Courage and Culture
16:28 Why Organizations Hire Rosie
19:29 Where to Find Dr Rosie Ward
20:06 Closing Thanks and Goodbye

Learn more about Wellness Law at www.wellnesslaw.com. 

On the Wellness Law Podcast, host Barbara Zabawa interviews Benjamin Emmert-Aronson, co-founder of Open Source Wellness (OSW), about creating a “behavioral pharmacy” that helps people act on common “behavioral prescriptions” like healthier eating, exercise, stress reduction, and social support—especially for patients in low-income communities who lack resources. Aronson describes OSW’s 90-minute weekly groups combining movement, mindfulness, health education, small-group health coaching, and group medical visits with primary care clinicians for 12-week continuity care. He explains OSW’s expansion through a national YMCA training cohort called the Community as Medicine Learning Collaborative, including clinic referral partnerships and evaluation and sustainability planning, and discusses addressing social determinants of health through produce partnerships and community-based YMCA resources. They also cover OSW’s corporate wellness events, nonprofit funding, and the tension between rigorous health coach credentialing and accessibility.

00:00 Welcome and Introductions

01:33 What Is Open Source Wellness

02:53 Behavioral Pharmacy Model

04:12 Scaling With YMCAs

06:22 Clinic Referrals in Practice

07:32 Who the Groups Serve

09:18 Group Medical Visits

10:11 Tackling Social Determinants

13:32 Corporate Wellness Events

15:39 Health Coach Training Access

19:56 Ethics Standards vs Licensure

22:20 How to Connect and Support

23:44 Podcast Closing

Learn more about Wellness Law at www.wellnesslaw.com. 

Attorney Christopher Barnewolt of the Pacific Legal Foundation joins the Wellness Law Podcast to discuss PLF’s lawsuit challenging the California Board of Psychology’s discipline of life coach Anna Runkle (the “Crappy Childhood Fairy”). Barnewolt explains that Runkle, who has openly stated she is not a psychologist or therapist, built a coaching business based on personal experience and techniques that helped her after a difficult childhood, including YouTube content, books, webinars, and paid coaching since 2016. After a 2023 complaint from an attendee in Maine alleging unlicensed practice, the Board issued a final order requiring a $2,500 fine and cessation of activity it deems licensed psychology. The conversation focuses on First Amendment protections, chilling effects on coaches, and the alleged overbroad, vague California definition of “practice of psychology,” while noting PLF’s nationwide pro bono work and related nursing-board overreach in Kansas.

00:00 Welcome and Guest Intro
01:21 Why This Lawsuit Matters
02:13 Anna Runkle Story and Business
03:35 Complaint and Board Discipline
06:19 Broader Pattern of Overreach
09:04 Pacific Legal Foundation Mission
10:14 Overbroad Psychology Definition
14:34 Chilling Effect on Coaches
15:39 Wellness Speech and Access to Care
19:26 Prior Restraint and Fraud Laws
21:13 Closing and Where to Learn More

Learn more about Wellness Law at www.wellnesslaw.com. 

Host Barbara Zabawa welcomes Dr. Romie Morales Rosado, a PhD-trained applied mathematician and data scientist and owner of Legacy Nova, to discuss how workplace wellness programs can better leverage data to prevent problems before they arise. Rosado explains her work helping leaders and institutions make proactive decisions by identifying emerging signals, improving how data is collected, defining a shared lexicon, and creating “connective tissue” across platforms so datasets can speak to each other. Zabawa links this approach to preventive law and the goal of designing employee wellness programs that improve wellbeing and reduce risks such as privacy or ADA-related complaints. They emphasize that organizations often already have the needed data, but require expert analysis to connect it, tell the right story, and answer the questions leadership thinks it is addressing. Contact information for Rosado and Wellness Law resources are provided.

00:00 Welcome to the Podcast

00:31 Meet Dr Romie

02:46 Preventive Law Mindset

04:13 Data Foundations and Lexicon

06:57 Wellness Data Opportunities

08:03 Connecting Data Sets

11:52 Turning Data Into Decisions

13:30 Closing and Contact Info

14:41 Outro and Resources

Learn more about Wellness Law at www.wellnesslaw.com. 

Host Barbara Zabawa welcomes Cynthia Marcotte Stamer to the Wellness Law Podcast to discuss how multiple legal disciplines intersect with “wellness law” and why it should be recognized as a distinct practice area. Stammer, an employee benefits and labor and employment lawyer with deep experience in health plans and ACA/HIPAA-related reforms, describes her public health roots and focus on changing systems rather than helping one person at a time. She explains how the American Bar Association enabled early collaboration, mentoring, and policy advocacy that can drive community-wide legal change beyond the profession. Their conversation contrasts wellness and healthcare, highlights inequities between luxury wellness (e.g., med spas, peptides) and basic needs (housing, food, access to medications), and emphasizes multidisciplinary, people-centric infrastructure solutions informed by real-world barriers, especially after COVID.

00:00 Welcome and Guest Intro
03:23 Cynthia’s Wellness Roots
04:52 Building a Practice and the ABA
06:56 ABA Advocacy Beyond Lawyers
08:54 Why Wellness Law Matters
11:31 How New Practice Areas Emerge
14:12 Wellness vs Healthcare Systems
16:26 Med Spas Biohacking and Equity
22:23 Multidisciplinary Solutions via ABA
24:08 COVID Lessons and Systems Thinking
27:55 Closing Thanks and How to Connect
29:48 Podcast Outro and Resources

Learn more about Wellness Law at www.wellnesslaw.com. 

Host Barbara Zabawa welcomes Chase Sterling, executive director of the Wellbeing Think Tank, a 501(c)(3) founded in 2021 that convenes monthly events and an annual summit to elevate evidence-based, integrated workplace wellbeing practices. Sterling explains she created the organization after seeing workplace wellness treated too narrowly and siloed, arguing wellbeing at work requires supporting individuals while changing organizational systems such as leadership, environment, and policies. The conversation covers a rise in outcomes-based programs tied to biometric standards and healthcare-cost pressures, and the need for employers to stop placing responsibility solely on employees and instead ensure workplaces “at a bare minimum” do not cause harm. Sterling shares tactics for influencing leadership by aligning wellbeing initiatives to business problems, using data, and addressing barriers like paid time for preventive care and manager accountability.

00:00 Welcome and Introductions
01:16 What Is Think Tank
04:19 Outcomes Programs Return
06:40 Shared Responsibility at Work
12:03 Selling to Leadership
15:48 Preventive Care Example
18:21 Who Leads Implementation
22:02 How to Get Involved
23:14 Podcast Closing Notes

Learn more about Wellness Law at www.wellnesslaw.com. 

Host Barbara Zabawa interviews Jennifer Lundman, executive director of the Institute for Behavior Change, about why the Institute was founded in the last year to develop credible, sustainable standards for health and wellness coaching—especially for coaches working inside healthcare systems. Lundman describes collaborating with coaches, health systems, and healthcare professionals to confront skepticism and stigma around “wellness,” clarify scope of practice, and build governance, integrity, and evidence for the profession. She shares that the Institute has developed standards, psychometrically validated competencies, and will launch a beta exam soon, with next steps including advocacy, implementation science-based clinical workflows, and research to strengthen generalizable evidence and expand access in underserved communities. They discuss billing codes as still “to be determined” and announce the Catalyst Convening in Columbia, Missouri (July 31 reception; August 1–2 main event), with details at instituteforbehaviorchange.org.

00:00 Welcome and Introductions
01:13 What Is the Institute
03:22 Why Standards Matter
05:09 Healthcare Skepticism and Scope
09:10 Validated Competencies and Exam
10:04 Implementation and Research Pillars
13:12 Protecting Coaching as a Profession
15:43 Billing Codes Reality Check
17:10 Catalyst Convening Details
19:34 Wrap Up and Resources

Learn more about Wellness Law at www.wellnesslaw.com.