Dealing with the Disruptive Practitioner in a Legally Compliant Manner

This session will explain how a hospital medical staff should deal with a practitioner who is disruptive to hospital operations. It will discuss disruptive practitioner policies a hospital should have in place and practical tips to correct or terminate the disruptive activity.

• Disruptive practitioner policies.
• Corrective action procedures.
• What constitutes disruptive behavior.
• Steps the hospital and/or the medical staff should take to see that the disruptive activity does not affect patient care or disrupt operations.
• Do not condone the problem until it gets to a point where it can no longer be ignored.

Disciplinary policies are progressive. A progressive policy applies increasingly more severe sanctions to additional incidents of bad behavior. Without documentation of past performance, when future incidents occur, it is difficult to justify more severe sanctions.
The session will provide an overview of how a hospital medical staff should deal with the practitioner who is disruptive to hospital operations, in a legally compliant manner. You will learn how to deal with the disruptive individual and the situation from the very beginning to the point where it becomes necessary to terminate the practitioner’s privileges and medical staff membership. You will learn what steps to take along the way, both to attempt to correct the disruptive relationship and to build a case that supports taking adverse action.

This session is designed for hospital executives, physicians who serve on peer review committees, and other healthcare providers who participate in physician professional review activities.

• Hospital executives
• Medical staff officers
• Physicians who serve on peer review committees
• Medical staff support staff
• Attorneys representing medical staff
• Safety Director
• Wellness program instructors
• Wellness program director and manager
• Wellness Committee members

William Mack Copeland, MS, JD, PhD, LFACHE, practices health care law in Cincinnati at the firm of Copeland Law, LLC, where he is president and CEO. He is also president of Executive & Managerial Development Group, a consulting entity providing compliance and other fraud and abuse related services. A graduate of Northern Kentucky University Salmon P. Chase College of Law, Bill is a frequent author and speaker on health law topics. He is a member of the American Health Lawyers Association, American, Ohio and Cincinnati Bar Associations. A former hospital chief executive officer, he is a life fellow in the American College of Healthcare Executives. He was awarded the American College of Health Care Executives Senior-Level Healthcare Executive Regent’s Award in 2007.