Giving Away the Keys to the Kingdom: Vendors and Your Website.

Certain third-party vendors are now offering to "assist" practices by placing ma- terial and links associated with their services on the practice's website. This offer requires the practice to provide access to its website's contents. Patient privacy, insurance coverage, ethical duties, and IT integrity are all reasons that a practice should not provide a vendor administrative access to its website. Vendors seek- ing to promote goods or services via the practice should never be given access to alter the practice's website content. In the event a practice needs website assistance, it should seek help only from a qualified and insured person or entity.

Doctor, Please Take the Stand: Stress, Duties, and Dangers of Physician Testimony.

Many physicians experience stress and anxiety when they are asked to testify in court or be an expert witness. Handling a barrage of attorney questions under oath can be challenging. And although testifying against a patient who has sued for malpractice is, of course, difficult, testifying against a colleague-for example, in an impairment or patient safety case-can be even worse. This article addresses some of the key reasons that cause physicians to resist testifying, and suggests ways for physicians to deliver their testimony in a way that is effective and can be understood by a jury.

Waiving Deductibles and Copays: No Good Deed Goes Unpunished.

In an age of high deductibles, many surgical candidates are requesting that practices reduce or waive the self-pay portion of the professional fee. These requests come with a risk to the practice. Third-party payer agreements often prohibit discounting of fees to patients. Claiming breach of contract and interference with actuarial calculations, some third-party payers have sued practices for waiving fees owed by their insureds. Only by having the proper policies in place may a practice safely engage in fee reductions for patients insured by an entity with whom the practice has a contractual relationship.

The Only Safe SMS Texting Is No SMS Texting.

Many physicians and practice staff use short messaging service (SMS) text messaging to communicate with patients. But SMS text messaging is unencrypted, insecure, and does not meet HIPAA requirements. In addition, the short and abbreviated nature of text messages creates opportunities for misinterpretation, and can negatively impact patient safety and care. Until recently, asking patients to sign a statement that they understand and accept these risks--as well as having policies, device encryption, and cyber insurance in place--would have been enough to mitigate the risk of using SMS text in a medical practice. But new trends and policies have made SMS text messaging unsafe under any circumstance. This article explains these trends and policies, as well as why only secure texting or secure messaging should be used for physician-patient communication.

Business associates gone bad: five tales of woe and ways to prevent them from happening to you.

Liability for confidentiality of protected health information extends beyond the walls of a medical practice. Studies show a significant number of breaches occur via the actions or inactions of third-party entities/business associates. These business associates are trusted with patient information to assist a medical practice and can include collection agencies, third-party billing firms, transcription services, etc. Medical practices can be legally liable for the breaches of their business associates. This article provides an overview as to proper methods of retaining and monitoring business associates in an effort to minimize exposure from these firms.

Photography consent and related legal issues.

The use of photography is an integral part of any plastic surgery practice. Photographs are part of the patient's medical record and thus are covered by both federal and state privacy laws. Liability issues may arise when patients are photographed without their knowledge and consent. With proper written consent, practices may use "before" and "after" photographs of patients. However, some states have specific requirements as to the manner in which these photographs are taken and what claims may appear as text with the photographs. This article seeks to discuss legal issues associated with the use of photography in plastic surgery practices, and provides sample agreements to serve as a basis for addressing these issues.