About Foley Hoag LLP and Sarah Bennett

Foley Hoag LLP, based in Boston, is renowned for providing legal services to clients in a range of industries, including life sciences, technology, cannabis, and government. With over 350 lawyers, the firm is known for its expertise in navigating complex regulatory environments, particularly in the healthcare and government sectors.

Sarah Bennett, Director of Research Services at Foley Hoag, plays a critical role in ensuring the firm’s research capabilities are ahead of the curve. She manages Foley Hoag’s information needs with sophisticated research techniques and industry-leading research tools. She is responsible for evaluating new products and technologies, and managing acquisitions and trials.

Sarah’s team is at the forefront of helping the firm stay up-to-date on the latest legal and regulatory developments. Having means to know about time-sensitive updates, as soon as they happen, is particularly crucial for Foley Hoag’s clients.

The Challenge of Keeping Up With Regulatory Updates

In Sarah's role, managing the vast amount of regulatory information relevant to their clients, especially in highly regulated sectors like healthcare, is no small feat. As Sarah explains, much of their work revolves around monitoring regulatory changes from a variety of government sources.

In particular, Foley Hoag needed a way to monitor various unofficial government sites that publish critical updates – before they appear in official channels, such as the Federal Register or the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR). This is so that the firm can provide the most timely advice to clients.

“If something’s published on whitehouse.gov, I need to know right away [...] Client expectations are that we would know as soon as possible that changes are coming down the pike."

With the speed of change in governmental policies, especially those relating to healthcare, Medicare, Medicaid, and medical devices, it was essential that Foley Hoag's research team be able to act fast.

The Challenge of Tracking Changes to Vendors’ Terms and Conditions

Additionally, the firm also needed to keep an eye on various vendor contracts, such as changes to terms and conditions (T&Cs).

“We’re using it for our internal contract review,” Sarah explains. Vendor contracts often contain embedded links to terms and services that can be updated at any time.

They needed a means to automatically monitor terms and conditions so that, when there is an update to the text-heavy legalese, they will always know.

However, before Sarah found Visualping, staying current with regulatory changes and T&Cs was a labor-intensive process—especially when they needed to monitor many sources across different levels of government, and when they had to recheck websites throughout the day.

“If there was a day when they knew something was going to get posted, they would have an attorney, who bills out at $600/hour, sitting, and refreshing the website until it came out.”

The traditional method of keeping tabs on these sites—manually reloading pages, or assigning attorneys or associates to monitor for updates—was neither efficient, nor cost-effective.

Solution: Saving Time and Money with Automated Web Change Monitoring

Before Sarah’s team found Visualping, Foley Hoag relied on in-house resources to manually track updates—often requiring a team of high-billing attorneys to monitor sites and refresh pages, in order to catch updates before anyone else.

“Because people knew it was coming, and we wanted to have the scoop.”

Visualping’s core functionality revolves around its ability to automatically check web pages for changes, whether it’s text, links, or images.

“We run those alerts on an ongoing basis, and it’s great. It feels like we’re able to keep up with being current, without having to assign a person to sit and reload pages.”

For Sarah and her team, this meant they could automate the monitoring of important regulatory developments, providing an efficient and cost-effective solution to the tedious research.

“With Visualping, we’re able to save on man hours, and be confident we’re going to know about things when they happen.”

Staying Current with Alerts from the Sources that Publish it First

While Foley Hoag also leverages traditional legal research databases, such as LexisNexis and WestLaw, as part of their legal and regulatory research – they have alerts set up everywhere – Sarah explains these tools are not optimized for real-time regulatory tracking.

“WestLaw and LexisNexis don’t get those changes until they’re posted in official channels, which can take days. If I wanted to use them to track something, I’d probably be a couple of days behind.”

This is because LexisNexis and WestLaw primarily track official, published channels—such as the Federal Register and CFR. They do not provide alerts from the unofficial sites that publish updates first.

Visualping, on the other hand, is able to monitor any web sources, on the internet, for changes. This ability to track updates across unofficial government websites, such as those on whitehouse.gov or other sub-government sites, was a significant gap that Visualping filled.

“Visualping allows us to track these specific website changes, these government websites, and that’s not an area that LexisNexis excels in. I mean, they don’t offer that.”

This immediate access has been especially beneficial in time-sensitive situations, which is often the case in highly regulated industries. Delays of even a day or two can significantly impact how a client reacts to new legislation or policy changes.

With Visualping’s alerts, Sarah and her team can be among the first to know about changes, ensuring they keep clients happy, and that they have a competitive advantage in delivering the most up-to-date legal guidance.

Foley Hoag can be sure they receive updates in real time, giving them a valuable head start.

“That’s critical—especially in certain areas of law.”

Conclusion

Given the nature of their work, staying ahead of such changes is critical – especially when dealing with highly regulated industries. Visualping has saved the firm valuable time and resources, all while ensuring they remain competitive in delivering the latest insights to clients.

“Automated alerts save us time and money and make everyone feel like they’re on the ball.”

Foley Hoag is able to maintain its reputation as a forward-thinking law firm that is always on top of the latest regulatory developments, providing clients with the most timely and informed legal advice possible.

Reach out to our team to learn more about how Visualping can help you and your team with legal and regulatory monitoring.