Physician Risk Management Medical Newsletter

Time-stamped EMR entries turn cases from defensible to candidates for settlement

Time-stamped electronic medical record (EMR) entries can complicate the defense of a malpractice claim if they provide a reason to question the physician’s credibility.

Prevent claims alleging failure to follow up on abnormal test results

Electronic medical records (EMRs) can potentially help to prevent missed diagnoses with “results management” systems that track outstanding clinician orders for diagnostic tests.

Use EMRs to document follow up with patients

To avoid malpractice claims resulting from a patient’s failure to follow up with recommended care, physicians should use electronic medical records (EMRs) to document their follow-up efforts, advises Sharona Hoffman, JD, LLM, co-director of the Law-Medicine Center at Case Western Reserve University School of Law in Cleveland, OH.

Find out what the EMR does in response to plaintiff discovery request

Physicians are using electronic medical record (EMR) functions that result in authorship falsification, disabling of audit logs, and document misattribution without understanding the legal implications.

Data integrity failures in EMRs is No. 1 concern

Providers often use electronic medical record (EMR) functions that result in authorship falsification, disabling of auditing functions, and document misattribution without realizing the legal implications of these functions, says Reed D. Gelzer, MD, MPH, founder of Trustworthy EHR, a Newbury, NH-based data quality and information integrity consultancy specializing in the legal aspects of EMRs.

Inaccurate EMR charting can complicate the defense

Inaccurate electronic medical record (EMR) entries have complicated the defense of some malpractice cases.

These EMR shortcuts are legally risky for MDs — Workarounds can complicate defense

Some electronic medical record features can result in physicians using “workarounds” to streamline documentation, but these actions can be legally risky. Plaintiff attorneys look for indications that physicians:

Both sides need IT expert to explain EMR charting

Requests for metadata are increasing the cost of malpractice litigation, because it requires that attorneys invest time and money to determine its meaning.

Plaintiff attorneys doing more e-discovery, but it’s not always fruitful

Many plaintiff attorneys now routinely request metadata from electronic medical records (EMRs), but in some cases, it ends up helping the defense.

Sunshine Act reporting has implications for malpractice litigation

Publically reported data on payments made to physicians will be available in September 2014, as a result of The Physician Payment Sunshine Act. This could help plaintiff attorneys to strengthen malpractice claims.

Will apology cause patient to sue? Perception is ‘outdated and inaccurate’

(Editor’s Note: This is the second story in a two-part series on apology laws. This month, we report on how a physician’s apology could affect the outcome of a malpractice suit. Last month, we covered a recent court ruling distinguishing between apologies that express sympathy and those that acknowledge fault.)

Man with spinal injuries commits suicide — $2.88 million verdict given

News: The patient, a 40-year-old man, sought treatment in May 2008 for chronic lower back pain at a pain clinic operated by two physicians. The initial treatment, which consisted of medication injections into the patient’s back, was successful for a time, but the patient returned to the clinic three more times seeking further pain relief.

Woman receives $14 million verdict in Yasmin prescription case

The patient, a 37-year-old woman, was prescribed the oral contraceptive pill Yasmin by her physician in an attempt to control irregular bleeding. Thirteen days after she began taking the medication, she suffered a stroke that resulted in serious brain damage.