J-A23011-16

NON-PRECEDENTIAL DECISION - SEE SUPERIOR COURT I.O.P. 65.37

PREMIER COMP SOLUTIONS, LLC IN THE SUPERIOR COURT OF

PENNSYLVANIA

Appellee

v.

UPMC HEALTH NETWORK, INC., A 

PENNSYLVANIA NON-PROFIT 

CORPORATION, UPMC BENEFIT 

MANAGEMENT SERVICES, INC., D/B/A 

UPMC WORKPARTNERS, UPMC HEALTH 

BENEFITS, INC., D/B/A UPMC 

WORKPARTNERS, MCMC, LLC, A 

WHOLLY-OWNED SUBSIDIARY OF YORK 

RISK MANAGEMENT, AND ALIGN 

NETWORKS, A WHOLLY-OWNED 

SUBSIDIARY OF ONE CALL CARE 

MANAGEMENT

APPEAL OF: UPMC HEALTH NETWORK, 

INC., A PENNSYLVANIA NON-PROFIT 

CORPORATION, UPMC BENEFIT 

MANAGEMENT SERVICES, INC., D/B/A 

UPMC WORKPARTNERS, UPMC HEALTH 

BENEFITS, INC., D/B/A UPMC 

WORKPARTNERS

No. 1398 WDA 2015

Appeal from the Order Dated August 13, 2015

In the Court of Common Pleas of Allegheny County

Civil Division at No(s): GD-15-007257

BEFORE: LAZARUS, J., STABILE, J., and STRASSBURGER, J.*

MEMORANDUM BY LAZARUS, J.: FILED JANUARY 10, 2017

____________________________________________

* Retired Senior Judge assigned to the Superior Court.
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UPMC Health Network, Inc., a Pennsylvania non-profit corporation, 

UPMC Benefit Management Services, Inc., D/B/A UPMC WorkPartners, and 

UPMC Health Benefits, Inc., D/B/A UPMC WorkPartners (collectively, “UPMC”) 

appeal from the order, entered in the Court of Common Pleas of Allegheny 

County, which lifted a previously entered confidentiality order. Upon review, 

we quash. 

The trial court summarized the relevant factual background as follows:

Premier Comp Solutions, LLC (“PCS”) is a limited liability 

company that provides workers’ compensation cost containment 

solutions and services to insured employers, self-insured 

employers, third party administrators and insurance companies. 

PCS services include panel development[1]and maintenance, 

injury management, medical bill reviews and re-pricing, and 

physical therapy and diagnostic network access. 

UPMC Benefit Management Services, Inc. (d/b/a UPMC 

WorkPartners) [(“Benefit Management Services”)] provides Third 

Party Administrative (“TPA”) and other services to Pennsylvania 

employers, including governmental agencies that have the 

financial qualifications to be self-insured for workers’ 

compensation expenses. UPMC [Health Benefits, Inc.] (d/b/a 

UPMC WorkPartners) [(“Health Benefits”)] also sells workers’ 

compensation insurance to employers in Pennsylvania by 

contracting with brokers who work on commission.

MCMC[, LLC,] and Align Networks (“Align”) are competitors of 

PCS. MCMC provides medical bill review and re-pricing services, 

while Align provides panel generation and maintenance services

____________________________________________

1 A provider panel is a list of names and contact information for at least six 

health care providers that are geographically accessible to the insured 

employer’s location and have specialties that are based on the anticipated 

work injuries of the employees of the insured employer.
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With respect to TPA contracts with public agencies, prime 

contracts must request disapproval in writing from the public 

agency to terminate a contract with a Disadvantaged Business 

Enterprise (“DBE”) subcontractor. PCS has been identified as a 

DBE subcontractor for WorkPartners.

. . .

In 2006, PCS entered into a Medical Bill Review and Re[-]pricing 

Agreement with WorkPartners, in which PCS would review and 

re-price medical bills submitted by UPMC WorkPartners in 

accordance with the Pennsylvania Workers’ Compensation Act. 

The agreement included language that stated that the parties 

agreed to hold in confidence any of the trade secrets, designs, 

improvements, inventions, data or information belonging to the 

others.

In 2010, Health Benefits was approved as a workers’ 

compensation insurance carrier, which caused the business of 

providing TPA services to be divided between WorkPartners and 

Health Benefits so that UPMC Health Benefits was recognized as 

the name of UPMC’s workers’ compensation insurance carrier.

In August 2010, Health Benefits decided to utilize PCS for panel 

development, maintenance, appointment scheduling, telephonic 

injury management, and network access for their insureds, while 

still developing its own panels located near UPMC’s hospitals and 

physician practices.

In July 2012, WorkPartners and Health Benefits decided to use 

PCS’[] physical therapy and diagnostic network for the majority 

of their employer clients and insureds. Health Benefits was able 

to take advantage of the discounts available through the use of 

the PCS network by having all of PCS’[] physical therapy and 

MRI network providers send all bills submitted by Health 

Benefits’ claimants directly to PCS.

In February 2014, WorkPartners sought to have PCS perform an 

extensive medical bill review and re-pricing test audit to 

determine whether PCS or MCMC provided the best service and 

savings. In the process, WorkPartners requested that PCS 

provide detailed explanations and supporting documentation for 

its decisions. PCS complied. Again, in response to requests 

made by WorkPartners, PCS later provided information about 

their medical providers, including tax ID numbers and PCS’[] 

unique identifier keys. 
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On September 15, 2014, PCS CEO Linda Schmac noted that PCS 

had not received an employer panel referral from Health Benefits 

since August 27, 2014.

On November 13, 2014, WorkPartners advised PCS that MCMC 

would receive the re-pricing contract. At the same meeting, PCS 

was informed that Health Benefits would begin to use Align and 

not PCS for all of its insureds’ new panel development, PT and 

MRI/CT services. WorkPartners also informed PCS that Align had 

been doing panel development for Health Benefits since August 

27, 2014.

Neither MCMC nor PCS are able to sign agreements with UPMC[,] 

which would require them to access WorkPartners’ exclusive PPO 

network discounts in a primary position[,] due to their respective 

PPO network access contracts with Coventry, the largest 

workers’ comp network in the nation.

Although WorkPartners had decided to use the services of MCMC 

and Align rather than PCS, on February 17, 2015, WorkPartners 

sent PCS a proposed Master Services Agreement which PCS 

opted not to sign. Consequently, PCS requested on February 27, 

2015[,] that the electronic data provided to WorkPartners by 

PCS be returned and that a certification be provided stating that 

none of the data had been provided to Align.

On March 26, 2015, Health Benefits and Benefit Management 

Services sent a letter to PCS terminating both their business 

relationship and their 2006 contract. The following day, Health 

Benefits wrote to the brokers who sell Health Benefits’ insurance 

policies and advised that effective April 30, 2015, Health Benefits 

had terminated its relationship with PCS and would be partnering 

with two new vendors for re[-]pricing and panel generation 

services. On April 14, 2015, WorkPartners notified PCS that it 

considered the termination of the 2006 Agreement to also 

terminate the subcontract agreements PCS held with the City of 

Pittsburgh, Port Authority, and the Pennsylvania Turnpike 

Commission under WorkPartners’ TPA contracts.

On April 22, 2015, PCS filed its [c]omplaint, raising six counts 

against [UPMC, MCMC, and Align, including multiple claims of 

breach of contract, violation of the Pennsylvania Uniform Trade 

Secrets Act, tortious interference with contractual or beneficial 

business relationships, fraudulent misrepresentation, and 

conspiracy.]
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On April 27, 2015, [the] court entered an order directing [UPMC] 

to produce to [PCS an 18-page long 2014 Report and Analysis 

(“18-Page Report”).] The 18-Page Report is an internal report 

drafted by a WorkPartners employee in April of 2014. The 18-

Page Report was produced to PCS and stamped as 

“CONFIDENTIAL SUBJECT TO COURT ORDER.”

On June 30, 2015, PCS filed a “Renewed Motion to Lift 

Confidentiality Order Regarding the 18-Page Report[,]” [which 

the court granted on August 13, 2015.]

Trial Court Opinion, 1/29/16, at 2-6.

UPMC filed a timely notice of appeal and court-ordered concise 

statement of errors complained of on appeal pursuant to Pa.R.A.P. 1925(b). 

UPMC raises the following issue for our review:

Whether the trial court erred in granting Plaintiff/Appellee PCS’[] 

Motion to Lift a Confidentiality Order and authorizing PCS to 

disseminate a confidential internal document, produced subject 

to a prior [o]rder directing that the document be used only for 

purposes of litigation and not provided to any third party, in 

order to “set the record straight” and “remedy the damage being 

done to the business” of PCS before any jury determination on 

the validity of disputed claims, in the absence of good cause to 

do so, and where the dissemination of the document will not aid 

in discovery?

Brief for Appellants, at 4.

Instantly, the trial court ordered that confidentiality be lifted as to the 

18-Page Report, and UPMC appealed the order in an attempt to maintain the 

document’s confidentiality. Before we address the merits of UPMC’s claim, 
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however, we must determine whether this appeal is properly before us since 

the order appealed from is an interlocutory order.2 

Ordinarily,

[a]n appeal may be taken only from a final order unless 

otherwise permitted by statute or rule. A final order is ordinarily 

one which ends the litigation or disposes of the entire case; 

however, “[a]n appeal may be taken as of right from a collateral 

order of an administrative agency or lower court.” Pa.R.A.P. 

313(a). A collateral order is defined under Pa.R.A.P. 313(b) as 

“an order separable from and collateral to the main cause of 

action where the right involved is too important to be denied 

review and the question presented is such that if review is 

postponed until final judgment in the case, the claim will be 

irreparably lost.”

Ben v. Schwartz, 729 A.2d 547, 550 (Pa. 1999). For the collateral order 

doctrine to apply, each of the three factors must be satisfied. Crum v. 

Bridgestone/Firestone N. Am. Tire, LLC, 907 A.2d 578, 583 (Pa. Super. 

2006).

We first consider whether the order satisfies the separability prong of 

the doctrine. Our Supreme Court has stated that an order is separable from 

the main cause of action where it is “entirely distinct from the underlying 

issue in the case” and “can be resolved without an analysis of the merits of 

the underlying dispute.” K.C. v. L.A., 128 A.3d 774, 778 (Pa. 2015) 

(citation omitted). Here, the parties dispute whether the 18-Page Report 

____________________________________________

2

PCS has filed a Motion to Quash Appeal for Lack of Collateral Order 

Jurisdiction, and UPMC has filed a response asserting that the order in 

question is a collateral order pursuant to the requirements of Pa.R.A.P. 313.
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should be confidential in part because the parties dispute whether the 

document tends to prove or disprove whether certain communications made 

by UPMC are false. See Response in Opposition to [PCS’] Renewed Motion 

to Lift Confidentiality Order. PCS asserts that the allegedly false statements 

in these communications interfered with its business relationships, which is 

one of the main causes of action in this matter. See Third Amended 

Complaint at ¶¶ 105-09; 183-203. Accordingly, the order in question invites 

analysis of the merits of the underlying dispute, and we do not consider the 

order appealed from to be separable from the main cause of action. K.C., 

supra.

Additionally, we note that UPMC cannot satisfy the second prong of the 

collateral order doctrine. Considerations relevant to whether the right is too 

important to be denied review include whether it implicates rights rooted in 

public policy or has an impact on individuals other than those involved in the 

particular litigation. Ben, supra at 552. In this vein, appeals from 

discovery orders to disclose potentially privileged information often satisfy 

this element. See, e.g., Dodson v. Deleo, 872 A.2d 1237 (Pa. Super. 

2005). Here, however, the 18-Page Report has already been disclosed in 

discovery, and UPMC has provided no legal support in its response to the 

motion to quash for its contention that confidentiality must be maintained, 

merely labeling it a “confidential internal document.” Response in 

Opposition to [PCS’] Motion to Quash, at 15. 
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Moreover, we note that the 18-Page Report was offered and accepted 

into evidence at a public hearing in April 2015; following that hearing, as 

permitted by the court, the document was disseminated to several 

governmental agencies.3 See Order, 4/29/15. As we noted in Dodson, 

“once disclosed, the confidentiality of potentially privileged information is 

irreparably lost.” Dodson, supra at 1240. Because the confidentiality of 

the 18-Page Report has already been compromised, the order appealed from 

does not involve a right too important to be denied review. Ben, supra. 

For the foregoing reasons, the order appealed from does not satisfy 

the collateral order doctrine as set forth in Rule 313(b), and we are without 

jurisdiction to consider the appeal.

Appeal quashed.

Judgment Entered.

Joseph D. Seletyn, Esq.

Prothonotary

Date: 1/10/2017

____________________________________________

3 The agencies include the City of Pittsburgh, the County of Allegheny, the 

Port Authority of Allegheny County, and the Pennsylvania Turnpike 

Commission.