Hi everyone, how are you all doing. I am doing 2 yr pulmonary fellowship (without critical care). when I was looking for jobs, most of the job offers are combined with critical care work. I signed a job which requires me to cover icu for 1 week, clinic for 3 weeks. This group has contract with hospital to take care of ICU, and they have nurse practitioner to help in ICU. Though I have enough clinical exposure in icu, I am not board eligible/ board certified in critical care. Employer is ok with it. I am concerned, Will I have any problems in future? One of my attendings told what if theres a law sue, you can't defend your case with out official critical care training..... please suggest me if pulmonologist are legally allowed to work as intensivist?
Are pulmonologist legally allowed to work in ICU?
- Thread starter rizdu
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It must be a busier ICU if they have an NP employed. The short answer is yes, IF there is a lawsuit you are at higher risk for losing because your lack of official training is an easy target. Why would you sign the contract, then wonder about this? Your ability to leverage/negotiate this time out is gone now that the contract is signed so now you either need to terminate the contract and suffer any penalty that ensues or nut up and do it until your contract term ends.
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It IS "legal" but it's not smart. And I also agree with your attending and the poster above me, you cannot be working in an ICU from the perspective of your own liability
Thank you....I was looking at NY state law and other websites, could not find any comment or suggestion regarding this..... only thing I could find is SCCM mentioning about studies about 24 hr availability of CCM doc in ICU vs otherwise...... anyways should i look into anything else? what care should i take regarding malpractice insurance?
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As already mentioned, what you are doing isn't illegal. If you have an unrestricted state medical license, you could legally perform neurosurgery if you wanted to. But if you end up sued (common in a state like NY), your lack of training would probably make the opposing counsel very happy. I personally wouldn't do it, but I also wouldn't go skydiving and people do that all the time. You're going to have to decide if the risk is acceptable to you.
