Stories and news from Jackson LLP. Articles include attorney spotlights, firm updates, and reflections on building and running a healthcare law practice. A look at the people behind the firm and the work we do for healthcare providers.
This round of audits will focus on the adequacy of written policies and procedures. In plain English: Ensure that you have updated written policies and procedures and that you adhere to them.
Patients who feel that they received treatment to which they didn’t consent may feel betrayed by their providers and distrustful of the medical system. This does patients and providers a disservice, and it undermines the patient’s dominion over his/her body. “Patient autonomy” isn’t a buzzword; it’s a mandate.
More times than I can count, I’ve been asked: “How long did it take for you to start feeling better?” I met Sandy, my physical therapist, when I was wheelchair-bound and in constant, horrific pain. So, I’m sharing this journal entry, written 15 days after meeting Sandy.
And to answer the question: It took less than 15 days.
My occupation was as a professional patient.
It’s like having two full-time jobs and never being done with work. It’s exhausting, time consuming, requires top-notch communication skills, and is a challenge each day. You get no days off. You have no coworkers. You get no compensation. Basically, it’s crap.
You have been retained to help the patient, not to investigate her. By using accusatory language, even in your personal notes, you reinforce an anti-helpful dynamic that is far from a partnership. If your goal is to build a relationship with your patient, then speak with her in plain language, document your notes using non-judgmental words, and trust her.
He brilliantly describes how the medical ethicists linger in the halls of Congress, between testifying at hearings and presenting at conferences. They “serve medicine and ethics, but not patients.” His descriptions conjure up a behind-the-scenes mastermind to me – the fictional “reasonable man” about whom I learned in law school, or an Aristotelian good man. This man – The Ethicist – has divorced ethical decisions from patient care in a decisively clean way.
We talked about how it could be an Olympic sport with the way I approached it — endurance trials, training, and support from a PT. We imagined that I’d receive some sort of gold-gilded trophy with a woman standing triumphantly in her underwear. I’d successfully mastered several dynamic challenges.
Erin recently sat down with Karen Litzy, a physical therapist in NYC and the host of the Healthy Wealthy & Smart podcast, for a candid conversation about what it’s like to live in chronic pain.
Why did we need to move from physician-driven healthcare into patient-focused care? Or from attorney-run cases to client-centered lawyering? Why are we so blind to the importance of building actual relationships with those we serve?
HIPAA has two general components: privacy and security. Most of our clients do a great job with patient privacy: they know not to discuss PHI, and they are generally committed to ensuring that their patients’ information remains private. However, HIPAA does not always place substance above form – and for good reason, if the breach examples provided above are any indication.
