Employed CRNA Toolkit

For CRNAs who rely solely on the malpractice insurance provided by their employer or facility, the information below will help you understand why it’s important to get answers to the following questions:

• Are you provided with your own separate limits of liability or are you sharing limits of liability with everyone else insured under your employer’s policy?
• What happens if there is a claim?
• If there is a claim, will you, your interests and your professional reputation be protected?
• Will you have any say in how the claim is settled or what’s reported to the National Practitioner Data Bank?
• What happens if you’re sued for something that occurred when you were working for a previous employer?
• What’s not covered by your employer’s policy?
• Should you have a policy of your own to supplement the coverage provided by your employer?

If a policy has a true consent to settle, the insurance company cannot settle a claim unless you consent to it. Many insurance companies say their polices have consent to settle, but it is often taken away in the fine print. We represent Medical Protective (MedPro) and I’m not aware of any insurance company that has a better consent to settle than they do.

If you’re involved in a claim with several other individuals and entities, and you haven’t purchased you own individual policy, you won’t have any legal representation that will look out for your best interests. You will have no say whatsoever in how the claim is handled or what’s reported to the National Practitioner Data Bank (NPDB). If you were to have our Supplemental policy, you would have your own attorney who would look out for your best interests. Your attorney would work in cooperation with the other attorneys involved in the claim. If you were also covered by any other policy (like your employer’s), the attorney provided by your Supplemental policy would hold the other attorney accountable and would not let them settle a claim against you if you neither caused nor contributed to the patient’s adverse outcome. While you would not have any say in how the policy provided by your employer would settle the claim, your employer’s attorney will be less likely to act in bad faith if you have your own attorney representing your interests in the claim settlement.

6. If someone has legal action filed against them, can the courts go after personal belongings? If so, how do you protect your assets?

A plaintiff’s attorney certainly could go after your personal assets. That being said, insurance money is the “easy money”. As long as you have an insurance limit that is usual and customary for your state (the usual and customary for most states is $1,000,000), that will normally be more than sufficient to protect you. It’s a lot more challenging for attorneys to turn personal assets like houses, boats and cars into money. So unless there’s little to no insurance, it’s very rare for attorneys to go after personal assets. In addition, as a CRNA, it would be very unlikely that you, and you alone, would be sued in the event of an adverse patient outcome. Even if you breached the standard of care, other parties such as the physician and the hospital/facility would undoubtedly be drawn into the claim and might end up contributing to a payout, so the amount of insurance money available to the plaintiff would be even greater than just your policy limits alone. 

The key is being certain that you have insurance that will be both sufficient and available if you should ever need it. The further you are away from the actual purchase of the insurance that protects you, the less likely it will be there when you need it. If you purchase your own insurance, you want to buy an occurrence policy from an admitted insurance company with a Best rating of “A” or greater.  

If you are relying on your employer for your malpractice coverage, you should consider purchasing your own policy to supplement what your employer provides. In most instances, employers provide claims-made coverage that is shared by multiple providers. If no “tail” is purchased on a claims-made policy, there is no coverage. If you are sharing limits of liability with multiple providers, the other providers could have claims that exhaust the policy’s limits before you are able to use it. The only time you wouldn’t  need to purchase a supplemental policy would be when employer provides you with your own occurrence policy that you don’t have to share with other providers. In that situation, you don’t have to worry about a “tail” and only you can draw down on the policy’s limits.

7. I am a full time CRNA with malpractice coverage provided by my primary employer. The new supplemental policy looks appealing. I may start doing  some very part time work in a plastic surgeon's office and I'm wondering if the supplemental policy would cover me for this work? Would I need to purchase the supplemental policy AND the moonlighting policy?

The supplemental policy is not intended to provide you with any primary malpractice coverage. It is designed to supplement the coverage that the plastic surgeon might provide on your behalf. If the plastic surgeon doesn't provide you with coverage under his or her malpractice policy then, yes you would need to purchase a moonlighting policy to cover the work you do at the plastic surgeon's office.

A supplemental policy is intended to supplement any coverage that is already provided by a hospital, group, or physician's office. It will not provide coverage for your moonlighting work.

• Supplemental  Liability Coverage Now Available for Employed CRNAs

Supplemental Malpractice Insurance for CRNAs Employed by Hospitals or Groups is a policy designed to protect you, your interests, and your professional reputation. The policy highlights below refer to this supplemental malpractice insurance policy.

Policy Highlights

• Occurrence coverage: No need to ever buy a tail
• An attorney to represent your interests if you have a claim
• Unlimited defense costs (investigation, attorney's fees, expert witness fees, etc.)
• No claim settlements without your consent (subject to policy terms)
• Administrative/disciplinary hearings coverage
• Deposition representation coverage
• Information privacy (HIPAA) coverage
• Defendant expense coverage
• Portability: You can take the policy from job to job
• Affordable premiums