Slips, trips and falls are a serious safety risk for many businesses in a variety of industries. The Healthcare industry is often at more risk than many industries for a variety of reasons.  Think of the types of healthcare facilities that are open to a high risk of slips, trips, or falls: Hospitals Elder Care Facilities – Nursing Home, Assisted Living, Senior Care, Continuous Care Retirement Communities Medical Office Buildings – with multiple practices located within Private Medical Practices Surgery Centers Physical Therapy | Rehab Centers Some characteristics unique to the healthcare community include: High volume of patients, visitors and … Continue reading

These two topics fit together like peanut butter and jelly.  You are probably wondering what cyber liability and the Daytona 500 crash have in common…  Well nothing really, except each risk can be managed. If we review the Daytona | Nationwide crash, we can see how they manage risk. You will identify many principles already in place and based on post-crash interviews, it appears they will continue to review for future improvements.  We will then review the risk of Cyber Liability and see how we could manage this risk more effectively. Daytona | Nationwide Crash: Prevention Strategy: The catch fencing … Continue reading

Old News – across America many hospitals | health systems are facing financial challenges. New News – many hospitals | health systems are looking for the right upstream partner.  Choosing the right partner and executing the transition period are examples of Strategic and Hazard Risks.  Today, I will focus on the Hazard Risk of “How to tie up all liabilities when selling your hospital.” If you are like most hospitals you will have some “Occurrence” policies and some “Claims Made” policies.  If you have an Occurrence policy, the process is quite simple.  However, most Medical Professional Liability policies are written … Continue reading

What do the following numbers and states have in common? $120,000,000 – New York $78,500,000 – Pennsylvania $74,000,000 – California $10,000,000 – Ohio $178,000,000 – Florida $144,000,000 – Michigan $58,600,000 – Connecticut These were large medical malpractice jury verdicts in the past 20 months. What does the term Emerging Risk mean? “A risk that has increased in frequency | severity or a risk that has presented itself for the first time – i.e. it didn’t previously exist.” The severity or likelihood of a large Medical Malpractice or Medical Professional Liability claim has increased in recent years. This is why we classify it … Continue reading

Super Bowl XLVII may be remembered as the “blackout” or “power outage bowl.”   When the power went out in the stadium the game was stopped, but social media blew up.  According to CNN, the number one twitter related moment of the Super Bowl was the outage which generated 231,000 tweets per minute.  There are many story lines that will be remembered – Ray Lewis’ last game, The Harbough Bowl, Beyoncé’s half time performance, and of course the power outage. Regarding the power outage, what lessons could be learned?  The following will outline 8 items to consider with your insurance and … Continue reading

Every physician and practice owner will sell their practice during their career.  There are a variety of reasons which will lead to the sale of your business, some of which include: Retirement Choosing to sell your practice to a hospital|health system and becoming an employed physician Merging your practice with a larger practice Death or disability What are some considerations that you should take into account? Cost of Tail policies if you carry any claims made insurance policies.  Medical Professional Liability (medical malpractice) are commonly written on this type of insurance policy form. Employees – What will happen to your staff?  … Continue reading

I am an Apple user and a huge fan of the iPhone.  One of the app’s that I like to use on my iPhone is USA Today’s breaking news alerts.  Whether it is every day or every few days I receive an alert on my phone showing: Breaking News: Title of Story.  Unfortunately, the news alerts have become increasingly negative in nature.  Example: The Connecticut Elementary School Tragedy.  Each event traditionally brings a review of the disaster recovery plans, lock down procedures, security measures, etc… The following will outline some key aspects surrounding disaster recovery plans for Healthcare Facilities (Hospital, … Continue reading

National data will show that physicians continue to gravitate out of private practice.  Ironically, these past few months I have seen multiple solo physician practices open. A physician who starts a practice from scratch faces many challenges: Insurance for their business Personal Insurance – Life, Disability, Business Overhead, Long-Term Care, etc… Loan for their equipment/real estate Third Party Payer relationships and billing Employees Electronic medical records Etc…. While the intent of this blog is not to solve all problems, but to provide some clarity on “What type of Insurance do I need to buy for my business and specifically what type of Medical … Continue reading

Like most days, I began my Tuesday morning (yesterday) by watching the news and surfing my favorite sites and apps for what is going on the in the world today.  To my friends, family and all others out east be safe and help others in any way possible.  The “Sandy Storm Tracker,” looks like things are pretty rough, but know everyone out east will pull together like our country always does.  Best wishes to all.  Ok, now back to my news surfing.  At about 5:30am, I noticed an article from the Montgomery Advertiser in Alabama.  It appears that another hospital … Continue reading

Whether you are a late night talk show junkie, an early riser who loves the daily news, a social media fanatic, or a talk radio enthusiast (if you know me I am a mix of all four depending on the day); one thing is for sure, you will hear a significant amount of discussion surrounding healthcare.  Much of this discussion will be used in the context of the upcoming presidential election and specifically the review and fact checking of the last two presidential debates.    One event in the news has probably received less overall media attention due to the increased … Continue reading