As a general practitioner, it might not be the easiest thing to do. There are a lot of things you need to include in the contract, and the salary plan should be agreed upon beforehand. On the other hand, if you’re a healthcare firm and are looking to draft a contract for anything at all, you might find that it’s not easy to make it inclusive and thorough. This is why it’s in your best interest to work with a medical contract lawyer, no matter which side of the coin you’re on.
Comprehensive Medical Contract Services
Physicians, physician groups, medical business, and other attorneys have placed their trust and confidence in our firm for their most vital and sensitive contract issues. Our breadth of experience, regulatory knowledge, and foresight enable us to handle matters involving:
Independent physicians and medical practitioner groups have to worry themselves with a lot of legal issues. Some of these issues include medicine-specific agreements like medical director agreements and physician employment agreements, and some are not. More generalized contract issues include employment agreements, management agreements, leases, and billing agreements.
Without the proper knowledge on how to deal with these issues, it can cost the firm and the physician a ton of money. Listed below are some of the most common types of agreements that every physician has to deal with. A contract lawyer can assist any physician or firm to draft an inclusive and protective agreement that ensure that both parties are treated fairly.
Medical Director Agreements (MDA)
- The MDA is a contract that regulates how the practice will be run and how the salary system, and what position each practitioner is assigned to do. These agreements are heavily regulated as to protect practitioners from being exploited by their employers. If the agreement is not well-drafted, it might not pass the state or federal regulation, which can result in the firm being fined or even shut down.
A good medical contract lawyer will be able to draft an agreement that abides by the law and helps to protect the interests of every party involved. This will save the firm from lawsuits and legal complications that can leave a detrimental effect on the firm.
Management Services Agreements (MSA)
- Healthcare practices and physician groups often work with management services companies to take care of their infrastructures. This will allow the doctors and physicians to focus on treating the patients while the business people take care of the corporate side of things. An MSA is a contract that prevents the management service from taking advantage of the firm, and vice versa. The agreement includes everything, from how the how to handle the accounting/bookkeeping/collection functions, to how the billing collection is going to be done.
This is a guideline for how these transactions need to be done, and if one party violates the agreement, the other party can go forward with a lawsuit.
Physician Employment Agreements (PEA)
- A healthcare professional needs to know what their extent of treatment ends. This is something that must be included in the PEA, as this will affect that medical firm as much as it does the patient. Here are some things that the PEA needs to include.
Ensure non-compete agreements are properly structured.
- Ensure mutual indemnity when necessary. Employers often seek indemnity from employees against wrongful acts – but physicians may also need indemnity against wrongful acts of the employer, particularly if the employer is handling billing and collections. Provide for fair compensation. Compensation is far more complex than a base salary. Pay may be based on productivity, net patient collections, and other factors.
A PEA needs to include compensation policy for both the employer and the employee against wrongful acts from one another. The PEA will provide a guideline for each practitioner and what they’re expected to do. This is a tricky thing to do, as there are many factors to include, and each practitioner at each position is will perform different treatments. It means that a PEA needs to be redrafted for each healthcare specialist. Additionally, the PEA will also include the salary for the employee, as well as the payment plan. Some medical firms offer a full shared-profits salary plan while others go by performance or work hour.
Call Coverage Agreements
- Call coverage agreements can ensure physicians are fairly compensated for providing emergency coverage to hospitals and emergency rooms. A medical contract lawyer can come up with an agreement draft that ensures that each party is treated fairly in any given situation.
Space, Equipment Leases & Purchase Agreements
Medical equipment and workspaces aren’t cheap. This is why there must be a purchase agreement and leases to ensure that the firm is not liable for anything other than their main responsibility to the venue.
These aren’t the only things that a medical contract lawyer can do for a medical firm, as they are proficient at any medical-related legal issues. If you’re having a problem with your medical contract, you should give a medical contract lawyer like Romanowsky Law a call.
