Melissa Yates represents health care providers, suppliers, laboratories, pharmacies, revenue cycle management companies, and manufacturers in Medicare and Medicaid audits, overpayment disputes involving statistical extrapolation and artificial intelligence (AI)-driven claims review,  government payor fraud, waste, and abuse investigations, Administrative Procedure Act (APA) litigation, False Claims Act (FCA) defense, and other government and commercial payor disputes. Her practice involves matters before the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General (HHS-OIG), the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ),  state Attorneys General and Medicaid Fraud Control Units, commercial payors, and federal district and appellate courts. She focuses on disputes involving statistical sampling and extrapolation, AI and algorithmic systems, data analytics, data-driven audit findings, reimbursement methodology, payment integrity reviews, and complex claims analysis and due process challenges.

Her background includes complex civil litigation inside and outside of health care. Before joining Polsinelli, Melissa served as a health care associate at a global Am Law 100 law firm in Charleston, South Carolina; an associate at a regional civil litigation law firm in Charleston; a judicial intern to the Honorable Richard M. Gergel of the United States District Court for the District of South Carolina; a law clerk to the Office of University Counsel at the University of Virginia; and a law clerk to the Commonwealth Attorney’s Office in Lynchburg, Virginia.