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We don’t like to think about bad days and disasters, but they’re a part of life. For businesses like medical practices, there are many ways that a mistake or accident could exceptionally damage their revenue and financial security.

That’s why there are many different types of medical insurance to help protect practices in worst-case scenarios. Our guide will break down some of the most critical coverage policies that every medical practice should own or seriously consider.

#1: Professional Liability Insurance

Professional liability insurance is perhaps the number one type of medical insurance you should prioritize to protect your practice. Otherwise known as medical malpractice insurance, professional liability insurance protects practices if errors from staff members result in patient suffering or death.

Medical malpractice litigation comes with the territory of medical practices, and without sufficient liability insurance for health care facilities, your practice could be on the hook for substantial damages. The average successful malpractice claim means hundreds of thousands of dollars in damages. Practices must have liability insurance to ensure a mistake and malpractice claim doesn’t bankrupt them.

#2: Property Insurance

A medical practice, big or small, is like any other brick-and-mortar business—it contains valuable property inside its walls like medical equipment and furniture. Property insurance covers damaged property and equipment in medical practices from accidents, natural disasters, or criminal activity.

It may not be the most important aspect of medical practice, but it’s hard to attract and keep patients comfortable without some furniture! Property insurance is there to replace your property quickly should the worst occur, from fires to theft.

#3: Business Interruption Insurance

Business interruption insurance is like a type of property insurance in that it deals with damage to the physical property of a practice. However, instead of covering the damages to the property, business interruption insurance covers the loss of income of shutting down a practice due to property damage.

If your practice ever suffers severe property damage, property insurance may replace some valuables, but what about the loss of income from closing the business for days, weeks, or months? Business interruption insurance supplements your practice’s income so you don’t have to worry about paying for rent or utilities while your business recovers.

#4: Worker’s Compensation Insurance

Worker’s compensation insurance is reimbursement for the business should an employee become ill or injured on the job. The insurance can cover medical expenses and replenish wages for workers who can no longer perform their duties.

Workers’ compensation laws vary from state to state—in some, it’s legally required, while in others, it depends on the number of employed workers and other factors. Whether or not you’re legally required to procure worker’s compensation insurance, it’s still valuable coverage for any small business, especially a medical practice.

#5: Practice Overhead Insurance

Are you a large revenue generator for your practice? For small businesses that would suffer greatly should the owner be absent, practice overhead insurance helps cover business overhead expenses.

Practice overhead insurance is different from disability income insurance as it doesn’t directly supplement an individual’s income. Instead, it helps cover overhead expenses of the practice. If your business would struggle significantly without your presence for days or weeks, you’ll want to consider practice overhead insurance to ensure overhead bills don’t get out of hand.

Overhead expenses that practice overhead insurance covers typically include:

• Utilities
• Rent
• Staff salaries
• Property taxes
• Accounting/legal fees
• Professional dues

#6: Life Insurance

It may seem morbid, but there’s no guarantee of tomorrow for anyone—and medical professionals know this, especially. That’s why life insurance is also critical for medical practice owners should the worst occur.

In the case of death, life insurance helps to cover costs and expenses for beneficiaries, including business partners. If you’re in a practice with significant partners, it’s wise for all partners to have life insurance policies in case the worst should happen.

#7: Business Auto Insurance

Business auto insurance is for practices that use vehicles as part of everyday business. If you’re a doctor who makes house calls, business auto insurance would be a good idea in case you should get into an accident while driving for work.

Or, if your practice uses company vehicles like vans for transporting employees or patients, business auto insurance ensures it’s protected should an accident or theft occur. Most personal auto insurance policies don’t cover losses or damages if a vehicle is used for business purposes. Business auto insurance covers this gap for automobiles.

Bonus Insurance Coverage for Practices to Consider

Those are some of the most critical insurance policies for medical practices, but there are still others that practice owners should consider. Two worth mentioning are employment practices liability insurance and employee disability insurance.

Employment Practices Liability Insurance

While you obviously believe in your staff and trust them to make the right decisions, you don’t want one of their mistakes to cost your practice’s financial security. Employment practices liability insurance covers businesses should an employee file litigation against the practice or another employee.

The litigation can be against the practice for wrongful termination or discrimination, or it could be against an employee for workplace harassment. The insurance covers legal defense costs and possible damages caused by the lawsuit. Hopefully, you never have to use it, but it’s always better to be safe than sorry.

Employee Disability Insurance

If you have a rather small practice with only a handful of medical professionals and revenue-generators, you understand that every employee is crucial to the practice’s operation. If an employee for a small practice is sick or injured, it could mean a sizable hit to the practice’s revenue.

Employee disability insurance differs from worker’s compensation since it covers lost revenue due to an employee suffering an injury or sickness outside the workplace. The policy also covers the loss of revenue from a missing employee so workers and practice owners have better peace of mind. Plus, it doesn’t require a disability, just enough injury or illness for the medical professional to be unable to see patients or perform their duties.

Hopefully, our guide has enlightened you on some of the key insurance policies that every medical practice should have, no matter its size or specialty of medicine. You may not think you need some of these insurance policies, but all it takes is one bad day to devastate a medical practice—unless it’s covered with insurance.

If you’re interested in learning more about medical practice insurance or purchasing a medical malpractice insurance policy, contact the experts at Baxter & Associates.

Malpractice insurance is, unfortunately, a requirement in many professions. Our guide explores the most common professions that utilize malpractice insurance below.

Primary Physicians

The most common profession for malpractice insurance is the primary physician in medical treatment. It’s easy to see why—healthcare often comes with life-and-death stakes, and if a physician makes a diagnostic or therapy error, it could lead to severe patient suffering or death.

That’s why liability insurance for healthcare facilities is essential for any hospital or care facility with primary physicians—it’s only a matter of when, not if, a malpractice claim is filed. Doctors are incredibly skilled and educated but still make mistakes like the rest of us. Without sufficient coverage, one physician’s mistake could cost them and the healthcare facility they practice in.

Attorneys & Lawyers

It’s not just medical professionals who have to worry about malpractice—legal professionals often face malpractice claims too. If a lawyer’s client is unhappy with their care and services, they can file a malpractice suit for damages in the thousands or millions of dollars. While malpractice insurance isn’t required in some states, it’s vital for practicing attorneys to have some form of liability insurance.

Examples of why a client may file a malpractice claim against their attorney include:

• Failing to disclose a conflict of interest
• Not communicating with the client
• Missing court dates
• Missing statutes of limitations

When a court case could decide a person’s life and liberty, lawyers can become targets for litigation afterward.

Nurses

Nurses may not have the same diagnosis and treatment responsibilities that a primary physician may have over a patient, but they handle much of the day-to-day treatment. Since nurses are not as responsible, they’re not as often named in malpractice litigation but still get targeted frequently.

Much malpractice litigation against nurses involves administering medication to a patient—either the wrong drug, the wrong amount, or the failure to administer medication. With nursing personnel stretched thin across the country, nurses will likely face greater malpractice claims in the future.

Nurse Anesthetists (CRNA)

All nurses can face litigation, but one profession facing a growing number of claims is CRNAs. A CRNA works directly with an anesthesiologist to administer anesthesiology and is responsible for their well-being before, during, and after surgery.

CRNAs are in demand now more than ever before as anesthesiology becomes a growing medical field—but with this growth is also an increase in malpractice litigation. Typically, the anesthesiologist is targeted, but CRNAs can be just as culpable if a patient is to suffer or die while administered anesthesia.

Chiropractors

The stakes are slightly lower for chiropractors than typical physicians or nurses, but chiropractic malpractice litigation is still common. A chiropractor can be sued if their spinal manipulation treatment harms or immobilizes a patient or if they fail to diagnose an illness or injury in the patient.

Common injuries that result in chiropractic malpractice claims include:

• Nerve damage
• Recurring headaches
• Disc herniation
• Muscle weakness
• Spinal stenosis

These professions are all different, but what they share is that they need sufficient liability insurance to protect them in case of malpractice litigation.

Along with education, skills training, and hands-on experience, chiropractors need a few things for their careers to thrive. Malpractice coverage is essential for medical professionals, and in this guide we’ll explain why chiropractors benefit from malpractice insurance and some of the basics of malpractice insurance.

What Is Malpractice Insurance?

Before we get into why all chiropractors can benefit from malpractice insurance, what exactly is malpractice insurance anyway? Malpractice insurance is particular professional liability insurance catered explicitly to medical professionals and businesses, like chiropractors.

A medical malpractice claim can arise from many situations, but most commonly from medical services that result in patient injury or death. It’s essential for medical professionals to have malpractice insurance—whether they’re a physician, nurse, chiropractor, or any other professional—as a malpractice claim could cost the defendant hundreds of thousands of dollars or more.

Most malpractice insurance covers costs such as:

• Attorney fees
• Arbitration costs
• Settlement costs
• Medical damages
• Chiropractic License Investigation defense
• Defense for Billing errors

There are two types of policies medical professionals can choose from in malpractice insurance: claims-made or occurrence coverage.

Claims-Made vs. Occurrence Malpractice Insurance

When a medical professional, like a chiropractor, chooses malpractice insurance, they must choose between claims-made or occurrence coverage. But what’s the difference between these coverages, and which is better for chiropractors?

Claims-Made Policy

A claims-made policy only provides coverage for incidents that occur and are reported while the insured holds the policy with the insurance carrier. In essence, the incident and the claim filing must happen while the policy is still active for the claim to be covered.

Pro Tip: If there’s a gap of time between an old and new insurance policy and you don’t want to be vulnerable to claims, you can purchase tail coverage.

If, for example, a chiropractor has claims-made coverage for 10 years but then retires and lets their policy expire, they would no longer be covered for those years. A malpractice claim that’s reported and filed five years later, when the policy passed, would not be covered by insurance if the policyholder allowed the coverage to expire.

Most malpractice insurance policies are claims-made, as they’re more affordable than occurrence coverage.

Occurrence Policy

An occurrence malpractice policy differs from claims-made because the policy could expire, but the policyholder would still be covered for the time they owned the policy. Let’s return to the example we used in the claims-made section.

If a claim is filed five years into a chiropractor’s retirement but had an occurrence policy, he would still be covered. An occurrence policy is a lifelong coverage, even if the policy itself later expires—the policyholder is always covered for that period when the patient had the treatment.

Occurrence policies may be more extensive in their coverage, but they’re also typically more expensive, making them less common than claims-made coverage.

Do Chiropractors Need Malpractice Insurance?

Chiropractors aren’t conducting intensive medical procedures or life-altering diagnoses, so do they need malpractice insurance? The answer is yes!

Like any other medical professional, chiropractors are sometimes sued by patients and patients’ families for damaged and alleged neglect. Chiropractors deal with spinal manipulation, and sometimes patients blame chiropractors for not solving their spinal issues.

Damages and compensation can result in thousands or millions of dollars, so if a chiropractor isn’t covered with chiropractor professional liability insurance, one claim could financially ruin them.

Types of Malpractice Claims Against Chiropractors

While good communication and documentation can help you avoid chiropractic malpractice claims, they still happen. Malpractice claims are particular to the individual litigant, but most claims against chiropractors fall under a couple of categories: a failure to diagnose and harm the patient from treatment.

Failure To Diagnose

One of the most common medical malpractice claims in the industry is a failure by a physician to diagnose an illness or injury. Failure to diagnose is also a common complaint against chiropractors, although not as prevalent as other medical specialties.

A chiropractor is more limited than a typical physician in a hospital or healthcare facility because they have fewer resources, like X-rays and other diagnostic tests. Plus, patients are often referred to chiropractors by physicians, so the original physician is typically liable if an initial diagnosis is missed.

But there are still cases where a chiropractor was found liable for failing to diagnose a spinal injury, leading to further pain and damage to the patient.

Harm to the Patient From Treatment

The more common malpractice claim against chiropractors is harm to the patient from treatment. We all know how critical spinal health is to our quality of life, and an error in treatment or diagnosis can lead to severe consequences for the patient.

Some common side effects of ineffective chiropractic treatment include:

• Neck injuries
• Nerve damage
• Herniated discs
• Soreness
• Headaches
• Stroke

These types of injuries are rare, but they do happen and can be caused from chiropractic treatment errors. Patients will rightly look for compensation for their suffering when these injuries happen, and the chiropractor will most likely be found liable.

Why All Chiropractors Benefit From Malpractice Insurance

All Businesses Have Risk

There’s risk involved in any business, whether it’s a chiropractic practice, an autobody shop, or a restaurant. Every business should carry professional liability coverage, but chiropractors especially need the protection to ensure financial security. It’s one of the most effective ways to reduce risk for your chiropractic practice.

Responsible for Patient’s Health

A chiropractor may not have the same responsibilities as a surgeon or physician, but they still control the health and quality of life of a patient in their hands. You don’t have to be a medical expert to understand spinal health’s importance to your overall health!

A patient trusts a chiropractor to help them feel better, and if a mistake is made, the results could cause severe damage and suffering to a patient. A chiropractor can’t assume they’ll be perfect their entire career and never make a mistake—they need safety nets and insurance coverage should problems arise.

Protect Themselves and Their Business

Many chiropractors own their businesses and are small business owners. A threat to their career, like a malpractice claim, doesn’t just threaten themselves but their entire business and financial security.

As the owner of a practice, a chiropractor is directly responsible for what occurs in their practice. Without insurance, it could mean they’re liable for injuries sustained on the premises they’re not involved in but still accountable since it’s their practice. Stay protected and preserve your future with medical malpractice insurance. For more information and a free quote, contact Baxter & Associates today!

One of the necessities of practicing in the medical field is having malpractice insurance. But how does one get malpractice insurance? We can help by guiding you through the necessary steps to acquire malpractice insurance.

Step #1: Find an Agent

The first step you should take to have malpractice insurance is finding an experienced professional who can help guide you through the process. Insurance on its own is often complicated and confusing, especially for those not familiar with the ins and outs of malpractice insurance.

An independent agent will know the coverage you need and where to look for the best options. Even your profession can affect your coverage, whether it’s chiropractic malpractice insurance or personal liability coverage.

Step #2: Review Coverage Options & Quotes

Once you’ve explained what you’re looking for and your budget to your agent, they’ll put together some quotes and options. These first quotes are initial options, and you can view them as a starting point to work from to find the perfect coverage.

This step is where you can narrow down your options and fine-tune your preferences regarding premiums, policy limits, or occurrence vs. claims-made coverage. You may find that you won’t get exactly what you’re looking for, but trust that your agent can find you the best deal.

Step #3: Submit an Application

After review, it’s time to select an insurance carrier and move forward by applying. Your agent will guide you through the application process and help you gather any information you need.

The insurance company should reply to your application with a decision to accept or reject relatively quickly, typically in under a week.

Step #4: Consider Offers & Bind Coverage

When the carrier accepts your offer, they will respond with some quotes and terms for your policy to review and consider. You should already know what to expect, and there shouldn’t be any surprises at this step.

This step is also where you can bind your coverage. Binding means that while the contract may not be official yet, you’ve bound the insurance carrier to you, and they will cover you from that date and time forward.

Step #5: Pay Premium and Confirm Policy

You’ve applied and agreed to the terms—all that’s left is to make it official with your first premium payment to bind coverage. Most insurance providers offer convenient payment plans.

Congratulations, now you’re protected with malpractice insurance! If you have further questions about malpractice insurance, consult with the experts at Baxter & Associates.

Physicians are some of the most well-educated and trained professionals, but they’re still human and make mistakes. Even in healthcare, errors happen that have consequences, which is why medical practice liability insurance is critical for individuals and facilities.

We’ll go over some of the most common causes of malpractice lawsuits for doctors, ranging from simple mishaps to more complex mistakes.

Misdiagnosis and Delay in Diagnosis

The number one cause of malpractice lawsuits for doctors is diagnosis. Although physicians are highly trained, educated, and skilled, they sometimes get it wrong or don’t diagnose an illness quickly enough to prevent suffering or death.

Misdiagnosis is when a physician gets the diagnosis wrong—often, this occurs from not knowing the patient’s medical and family history well enough. A delayed diagnosis is when a doctor is correct in their diagnosis, but it’s too late, typically because of a delay in ordering a test or recommending a specialist.

Failure To Treat

Along with misdiagnosing a patient, sometimes a physician fails to see the injury or illness in a patient and fails to treat them, resulting in injury or death. Sometimes illness symptoms are so minor at first that they can seem like typical aches and pains any average person would have.

One example is a patient experiencing minor chest pains—it’s easy for a doctor to assume it’s simply heartburn, as most signs point toward that diagnosis. But sometimes it can be a prelude to a more severe illness; and before a physician can administer treatment, it’s too late.

Childbirth Injuries

Childbirth is a wondrous journey for many that goes off without a hitch, but there’s still the potential for pregnancy, labor, and delivery problems. Such problems can arise in the mother or the fetus and appear minor on the surface but belie deeper issues.

Malpractice lawsuits from childbirth injuries can include failure to perform prenatal tests, failure to execute a c-section, or the improper use of birthing tools like forceps.

Medication Errors

Medication is an essential aspect of medical treatment, and with physicians prescribing so many medications to so many patients every day, it’s logical that someone can make a mistake occasionally. Medication errors is an umbrella term that can include many different types of mistakes, including:

• Misdiagnosis and prescription of wrong medication
• Incorrect dosage (overprescribing)
• Allergic reaction to a medication
• The patient is administered the wrong dosage/medication

Surgical Errors

Like administering medication, surgeries are something that happens every day, and even the most skilled surgeons have slip-ups. Some examples of surgical errors that have resulted in lawsuits are surprisingly simple, like:

• Leaving surgical tools inside the patient
• Performing surgery on the wrong patient
• Performing surgery on the wrong body part

It just goes to show that it’s always wise to double-check before starting your work!

Claims-made coverage is one of the most common insurance policies for professionals. If you’d like to learn more about this type of coverage, we’ve got you covered with the key things you need to know and the benefits of claims-made insurance policies.

What Is a Claims-Made Insurance Policy?

What do people need to know about a claims-made insurance policy? Claims-made coverage is a form of professional liability insurance from a malpractice insurance agency. Many professions require professional liability insurance, but it’s especially common for medical professionals.

Essentially, a claims-made policy covers the insured only when the coverage is active. So, if you have a claims-made policy for three years, you’re protected for as long as that policy is in effect—if it expires, you’ll need to get a new policy to stay covered.

How Is Claims-Made Different From Occurrence-Based Coverage?

Under professional liability coverage, applicants can choose between claims-made or occurrence-based coverage, but what’s the difference? The significant difference is that claims-made policies are more restricted, while occurrence-based policies will always cover the insured even after the policy lapses.

For instance, if you had an occurrence-based policy for two years, you would always be insured for those two years even if the policy expires. A claim could be filed ten years later, but if it falls within that period where you had occurrence-based coverage, you’ll still be covered.

A claims-made policy only covers you if the procedure is still active. If you let your policy expire, you won’t be covered for the time you were insured—you’ll need additional or retroactive coverage.

What Are the Benefits of a Claims-Made Insurance Policy?

Claims-made policies are especially prevalent in the healthcare industry. Why do medical professionals choose claims-made insurance—what are the benefits?

More Affordable

The most straightforward answer is typically the correct one, and in this case, most choose claims-made policies because they’re more affordable. A claims-made policy may not offer the continued coverage of an occurrence-based policy, but it makes up for it by providing lower initial premiums.

The lower premiums benefit individuals and facilities purchasing coverage for their staff in a group policy. The initial lower premiums free up cash flow for businesses and individuals.

Add Extended Coverage

There are ways to add extended coverage to a claims-based policy through retroactive and tail coverage. Retroactive coverage means that your policy also covers claims made before the coverage went into effect, so there are no gaps in coverage.

Tail coverage goes the other way, covering you after your policy is expired. Tail coverage is often utilized as a stopgap between an old insurance carrier and a new one to ensure the individual is always protected.

Those are the basics and benefits of claims-made insurance policies, but there is much more to know if you’re interested in purchasing coverage. If you’d like to learn more, consult the experts at Baxter & Associates, who can help you get the insurance policy that best fits your needs.

CRNAs play a crucial role in the health-care profession, and there are numerous benefits to the occupation. But there are also many challenges that CRNAs face in their profession. Current issues like burnout, staffing shortages, and training barriers are some of the responsibilities nurse practitioners face in their practice.

In our guide, we’ll take a closer look at the CRNA role, the responsibilities, what it takes to become one, and the current and future problems.

What Is a CRNA?

A Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetist (CRNA) has an essential job in anesthesiology. Surgeons and physicians administer anesthesia to a patient through intravenous drugs or inhaled gasses before performing surgery or a medical procedure so that they don’t feel pain.

The CRNA works with the anesthesiologist throughout the procedure. Some of the tasks a CRNA will do include:

• Developing an anesthesia plan
• Educating the patient on the anesthesia plan and procedure
• Physically assessing the patient
• Preparing the patient for the procedure
• Assisting in the administration of the anesthesia
• Supporting, positioning, and monitoring the patient during the procedure
• Monitoring the patient post-procedure

As you can see, a CRNA has many serious responsibilities that will determine the well-being of the patient and the result of the surgery or medical procedure. While an anesthesiologist may develop a big-picture treatment plan for many patients, the CRNA is responsible for the daily tasks and monitoring of patients.

Where Do CRNAs Work?

CRNAs can work in any health-care facility that performs medical procedures or surgeries requiring local or general anesthesia. CRNAs work in:

• Hospitals
• Surgical clinics
• Outpatient care centers
• Doctor’s offices
• Emergency rooms
• Military facilities

How Do You Become a CRNA?

Joining the CRNA profession is a long and challenging process that can take nearly a decade of schooling, training, and working. First, an individual must become a Registered Nurse (RN) before becoming a CRNA.

Therefore, they must first obtain a degree in nursing or an associate degree and pass the National Council Licensure Exam to get an RN license. It typically takes two to four years for an individual to begin schooling and eventually obtain an RN license.

Once licensed, an RN will work to gain experience, typically for about a year, before entering a postgraduate nursing program. A CRNA postgraduate program will usually take two to three years, although some accelerated curriculums are faster by a few months.

After years of courses and clinicals, the individual can take the certifications exam from the National Board of Certification and Recertification for Nurse Anesthetists. Once passed, they receive their license.

The Benefits of Becoming a CRNA

As anyone can see, it takes a lot of commitment to become a CNRA, so what are the benefits of joining the profession? CRNAs are a growing career, and industry experts expect the demand for their skills and training to grow in the coming years.

Good Wages

There’s no doubt that some choose the CRNA profession because it’s one of the best-paying nursing jobs available. Various factors affect individual wages, but the median salary in the profession is around $180,000.

In more rural states and areas, like Wyoming or Idaho, demand is high for CRNAs, so the salary increases even more. The top wage for CRNAs hovers around $270,000 a year, so there’s a payoff for those years of school and training.

In Demand

The anesthesiology field already has a strong demand for capable and effective CRNAs, and industry experts predict that demand will continue to increase in the coming years. The US is an aging population, which means there’ll be a more significant proportion of older people in the coming years.

An aging population means more chronic conditions and comorbidities—ailments that require more surgical procedures and anesthesia. Over the next decade, CRNAs will be one of the most in-demand jobs in the health-care industry, which will lead to higher wages and better benefits.

Autonomy

Although CRNAs work hand-in-hand with anesthesiologists, they enjoy a lot of autonomy in their daily tasks and responsibilities. They don’t do their job with a supervisor breathing down their neck all day— they perform the bulk of the work on their own in many cases.

Many CRNAs say that one of their favorite parts of the job is the leeway they have to make decisions about treatment and patient monitoring. But is being a CRNA stressful? Like most health care professions, it is more physically and emotionally demanding than many other jobs.

6 Challenges CRNAs Face

It’s not all positive for CRNAs, though. There are still many challenges that CRNAs face in their profession, from staffing shortages to education barriers and more.

Burnout

CRNA burnout is real, and it’s perhaps the biggest challenge that CRNAs face is the mental and physical fatigue from the job. Burnout is not exclusively a CRNA problem—the entire medical profession deals with this dilemma, which the COVID-19 pandemic worsened.

According to the American Association of Nurse Anesthesiology, four out of every 10 CRNAs reported high levels of occupational burnout during the pandemic. Burnout amongst CRNAs means that more people are likely to change careers, retire, or make mistakes on the job due to physical or mental fatigue. The causes of burnout varies, but one culprit is a CRNA shortage.

Nurse Shortage

One of the principal reasons for burnout amongst CRNAs and the entire industry is the nursing shortage. A shortage of nurses was a problem for many areas of the health-care industry before the pandemic, and COVID-19 exacerbated the challenge.

Over the next decade, the health-care industry expects to have a shortage of nurses in numerous professions, including CRNAs. More nurses are leaving voluntarily or retiring, and because the education and training of CRNAs is such a long and arduous process, many people worry that there won’t be enough trained professionals to fill the gaps left open.

Increase Demand

While this shortage is occurring, there’s also an increase in demand for CRNAs. Many rural or impoverished communities are trying to expand their health-care capabilities, and CRNAs play an essential role.

But are there enough CRNAs to fill these roles? That’s one of the significant challenges facing the profession in the next decade.

Education and Training Barriers

As we laid out, it takes many years of schooling and training for an individual to become a CRNA. They have many crucial responsibilities, so education is necessary, but it presents a considerable barrier to growing the profession. After all, many people don’t have the time or money to spend six or eight years working toward becoming a CRNA.

Significant Responsibilities

Every day, a CRNA works with patients that could be facing life-or-death circumstances, depending on the setting and the medical procedure. Anesthesia can present many severe problems to a patient’s health if there are mistakes, which is why CRNAs and anesthesiologists undergo so much training and education. But it’s no doubt a challenge for CRNAs to have such drastic responsibility almost every day at work.

Malpractice Lawsuits

Nobody, not even a CRNA, is perfect. In fact, the issues nurse practitioners face happen in most other health care professions. CRNAs make mistakes like everyone else, but when errors happen, they can result in dire consequences, leading to malpractice lawsuits. Everyone working in the medical profession has to deal with malpractice claims, and CRNAs are no different.

That’s why CRNA liability insurance is necessary for all CRNAs to protect their careers and financial lives. Liability coverage ensures that CRNAs have a fair chance and won’t lose their career over a mistake. Contact us for a quote regarding malpractice insurance. To learn more about CRNA burnout, shortage, and other challenges, explore our blogs.

As healthcare professionals, we all strive to help our patients recover and move on to live better lives. Unfortunately, things don’t always end up that way. Make sure you’re prepared and protected by following our tips for handling bad patient outcomes in healthcare.

Continue reading Tips for Handling Bad Patient Outcomes in Healthcare

A nurse practitioner is an essential job in the health care industry with many responsibilities, but with those responsibilities comes risk. Nurse practitioners play a critical role in providing patient care and improving health outcomes. However, with this important role comes significant responsibility, including the need to mitigate risks that can lead to medical errors, malpractice claims, and other adverse outcomes. Medical malpractice claims are part of working in healthcare, so to help, we’ve put together a guide on the duties, malpractice claim reasons, and how to reduce risk as a nurse practitioner.

What Is a Nurse Practitioner?

Nurse practitioners occupy a vital role in the health care industry, and even if you don’t visit the doctor often or remember it, you’ve probably interacted with one before. They operate in a middle ground between physicians and nurses, taking on more primary care responsibilities than a registered nurse.

Nurse practitioners are helpful in regions with a high volume of patients or a low number of physicians. They can take some of the load off of physicians by administering primary care to more manageable patients and fill in communities where there aren’t many physicians for the residents.

Interesting Stat: Americans make over a billion visits to nurse practitioners every year.

Responsibilities of a Nurse Practitioner

A nurse practitioner has many responsibilities, with about 70 percent of them providing primary care for patients. In many areas in the country, a nurse practitioner is the closest thing to a physician a community can offer.

As part of primary care, nurse practitioners are responsible for:

• Ordering, performing, and analyzing lab work and x-rays
• Prescribing and administering medications
• Diagnosing and treating chronic conditions (diabetes, infections, physical ailments, etc.)
• Educating patients on healthy lifestyle choices
• Managing overall patient care

That’s just a brief description of the duties a nurse practitioner can perform in their role. It also varies in the facility, other staff, and specialty they practice.

Areas Nurse Practitioners Practice

A nurse practitioner has a broad set of skills that apply to almost any specialty in healthcare. Some of the most popular practices nurse practitioners specialize in include:

• Acute care
• Adult health
• Family health
• Oncology
• Pediatrics
• Emergency

Do Nurse Practitioners Get Sued?

Can you sue a nurse practitioner? Although nurse practitioners may not have the same responsibilities for patient care as physicians, they’re still liable for their well-being, and patients can hit them with a medical malpractice claim. Nurse practitioners make up a small portion of malpractice claims, but they’ve been steadily rising since the early 1990s.

In a study analyzing malpractice claims between 1990-2019, nurse practitioners have steadily been named in a more significant percentage of lawsuits, even though paid malpractice claims have fallen by more than half in roughly the same period.

In 2019, 420 malpractice claim payments were made on behalf of nurse practitioners—the highest number on record. But, considering there are over 350,000 nurse practitioners in the country, it’s not exactly typical for one to get sued.

Cost of a Medical Malpractice Claim Against Nurse Practitioners

There may be a relatively low number of paid medical claims against nurse practitioners, but they’re still noteworthy and worth taking preventive measures against. The average cost of a paid claim against a nurse practitioner is over $350,000.

If you don’t have professional liability insurance for nurse practitioners, the cost of paying the claim could significantly hamper your finances and limit your career. Like anything else, it’s better to be safe than sorry with insurance.

Common Reasons for a Malpractice Claim Against a Nurse Practitioner

Since nurse practitioners perform so many duties and have so many responsibilities, the reasons for the malpractice claim can vary. However, most of the malpractice claims against nurse practitioners fall under the following categories, ordered from most common to the least common:

• Diagnosis errors
• Treatment errors
• Failure to diagnose
• Medication-related allegations (over-prescribing, ignoring medication allergies, etc.)
• Delay in diagnosis
• Delay in treatment

Medication-related allegations and errors have risen the most due to the ongoing opioid epidemic that damaged many parts of the country. In the previous decade or so, medication allegations have nearly doubled. Because nurse practitioners are responsible for prescribing drugs like opioids in many cases, they can be held accountable in some instances of addiction.

Medication Administration

The opioid epidemic has been one of the most significant and damaging developments in the healthcare industry in the 21^st century. The over-prescribing of an opioid is a common complaint filed against nurse practitioners. However, such claims typically focus on the manufacturers and sellers rather than the physicians and nurse practitioners.

Medication-related allegations aren’t limited to just overprescribing. Sometimes the incorrect amount is prescribed to a patient, or a nurse practitioner prescribes them a drug they’re allergic to. Some claims are as simple as the wrong medication being administered to the wrong patient—basic errors that can slip through the cracks.

Diagnosis Errors

There are different kinds of negligence that can affect nurse practitioners and other clinicians. The most common malpractice complaint against nurse practitioners is diagnosis errors. As most nurse practitioners administer primary care, this means ordering tests, analyzing, and coming up with a diagnosis.

They’re rare, but mistakes happen, and sometimes an X-ray is misread, or a diagnosis takes too long, and it’s too late to give adequate treatment.

Risk Reduction Strategies for Nurse Practitioners

There’s a risk for nurse practitioners, but there are ways to reduce risk as a nurse practitioner against medical malpractice claims. Risk reduction strategies often come down to open communication with the patient and proper documentation.

Be Present With the Patient

A common refrain from patients about nurse practitioners—and physicians, nurses, and other medical professionals—is that they didn’t feel heard or understood. Nurse practitioners typically have a lot of patients, and when the waiting room fills up with anxious patients, it can get distracting and difficult to give everyone the time they need.

But it’s still paramount that nurse practitioners give the patient their full attention. Explain their diagnosis, treatment, symptoms, and medication as plainly to them as possible, and give them adequate space and time to ask questions.

Sometimes, a patient or family member wants to blame someone for a negative outcome, and if they feel they weren’t treated respectfully, they might choose the nurse practitioner.

Keep Thorough Documentation

Proper documentation is vital in health care—every nurse practitioner and medical professional knows this. It can be a chore, but you should never take shortcuts when promptly filling out proper documentation with precise detail.

The documentation gives us a clear, written timeline of the patient’s admittance, symptoms, treatment, tests, and other important information. Since most claims occur years after the patient’s treatment, this information is essential to understanding what happened. When your career and finances are at stake, you’ll be thankful you were as detailed as possible.

Make Personal Notes

Along with the official documentation, it’s not a bad idea to keep a personal log and journal of patient notes handy. In personal notes, you can be more detailed and add more info than may be needed on the patient’s documentation.

Especially if you feel a patient interaction was hostile or antagonistic, it’s a good idea to start keeping notes sooner rather than later, just in case.

Double-Check the Medicine and Patient

Over a day, a nurse practitioner can fill out and administer dozens of medical prescriptions. With such a high volume every day, mistakes are bound to happen—the wrong patient receives the incorrect medicine, or it’s the wrong amount, or even given at the wrong time.

It’s easy to become complacent, but the best advice to avoid these possible critical errors is to do what carpenters do—measure twice and cut once. Always double-check the drug, dosage, and patient to be 100% certain, even if it means losing a couple of minutes every day.

Like other clinicians, nurse practitioners need malpractice insurance. To learn more about the average cost of malpractice insurance, contact Baxter & Associates today.

Medical professionals are some of the most well-educated and highly skilled workers, but that doesn’t mean mistakes don’t happen. That’s why many choose malpractice insurance should something go wrong that leaves them liable.

Like all medical professionals, physician assistants need malpractice insurance, and our explainer will break down the key reasons why.

Nobody’s Perfect

Although highly skilled and educated, physician assistants (PAs) are still human, which means they’re not perfect. PAs make mistakes at work like anyone else at their job, including other medical professionals.

Hospitals and medical facilities ask PAs to do a lot, from ordering tests to examining patients and administering treatments. Even the best PAs can have the occasional slip-up. The difference is that when mistakes happen, there can be dire consequences that result in suffering or even death. Errors are often inconsequential, but PAs need insurance to protect their financial future and career when oversights have more profound effects.

Increased Responsibility

PAs operate in a crucial but unique area of healthcare, performing many of the same duties that would fall to a certified physician. Initially, PAs originated in communities that lacked doctors or were overrun with too many patients for the local physicians to handle.

Over the decades into the 21^st century, PAs have taken on more responsibilities to offset shortages in physicians and nurses. With more responsibilities and duties, PAs are often stretched to their limit, making them more susceptible to mistakes.

Claims Are on the Rise

Although they may not be the target for as many malpractice claims as physicians, PAs still get sued and have been named as defendants more often recently. Studies show that between 2017 and 2019, PAs were targeted in malpractice litigation over 200 times every year, which is a substantial increase from earlier figures, which were around 70 in the year 2000.

Malpractice insurance for health professionals like PAs is essential to ensure that their career and financial future aren’t ruined by one mistake and malpractice claim. Monetary compensation for a successful claim can reach six figures, and without proper insurance, PAs and medical professionals can be left to pay that sum themselves.

Clearly, physician assistants need malpractice insurance as much as physicians and medical professionals do. PAs need to ensure their future is protected.