Professional liability insurance as a volunteer

bigbaldguy said:
Not exactly what you were referring too but this article has some interesting info on issues regarding EMS being sued. Here is the excerpt.

" Employees of government EMS systems, including municipal and county EMTs and paramedics, enjoy another type of statutory protection, called sovereign immunity. In most states, sovereign immunity statutes mirror the language of the Federal Tort Claims Act, which requires the U.S. government to indemnify EMS personnel for negligent acts, while imposing a limit of $100,000 on damages. Thus, in most states, a patient who sues a municipal EMT for negligence may collect up to $100,000 from the city in which the incident occurred, but nothing from the EMT personally.

Note that these statutes provide immunity from liability, not from lawsuits. In other words, they do not keep plaintiffs from hauling EMTs and paramedics into court, even though a judge may ultimately dismiss the claim. Because the defendant may incur significant legal expenses in the process, it's better to avoid the lawsuit entirely, and to rely on statutory immunity only as a last line of defense."

And here is the link to the actual article.

http://www.emsworld.com/print/EMS-World/Surviving-a-Lawsuit/1$6186

My concern was not that I would be found liable but that I would be sued at all. As it's often said anybody can sue anybody these days.
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Most insurance policies have limits of 100k per person and 300 per incident.
 
I was an insurance investigator 1990-1997.

I never saw anybody viably sued personally for anything. I saw them named as a procedural matter.

Again, not to disuade anyone from buying insurance, but, most lawyers will not sue anyone ON A CONTINGENT BASIS if they are not a big company, the government, or someone with insurance that covers the suit.

As I said, if the premium for an EMT policy is less than $100 a year, that means the company the writes them has a very low rate of claims/lawsuits because BY DEFINITION the adminstrative costs of running the company, th defense costs and indemnity costs for claims and suits are spread out among all the policy holders.

Insurance companies make no profit from premiums. They make profit from investing the money while they have it in their hands.
 
My policy actually has a much higher limit then the 100k/300k but only because it was no more expensive to do it that way. The idea that only people who have insurance are sued is debatable. By law an insurance company can not disclose if you have a policy with them. So a lawyer can't just call up insurance companies and ask if a defendant is insured. I agree though that if you don't have much in the way of assets then there is less need to have insurance. However what if you go on to become an RN or PA or even an MD. It is not unheard of for settlements to be attached to future earnings (admittedly I found no instances where this was done at a medic/emt level). More importantly because I have a good job that makes decent money I am by definition a better target of a lawsuit then say an 18 year old EMT with no assets and an entry level job. 18 years ago when I was 18 I wouldn't never have even looked into a policy like this but now I have more obligations and more assets to protect. I feel that the very minimal cost of the policy (48 dollars) does reflect the very long odds of my ever being sued, but lets face it long odds doesn't mean it won't ever happen.

Just my 2 cents :)
 
bigbaldguy said:
My policy actually has a much higher limit then the 100k/300k but only because it was no more expensive to do it that way. The idea that only people who have insurance are sued is debatable. By law an insurance company can not disclose if you have a policy with them. So a lawyer can't just call up insurance companies and ask if a defendant is insured. I agree though that if you don't have much in the way of assets then there is less need to have insurance. However what if you go on to become an RN or PA or even an MD. It is not unheard of for settlements to be attached to future earnings (admittedly I found no instances where this was done at a medic/emt level). More importantly because I have a good job that makes decent money I am by definition a better target of a lawsuit then say an 18 year old EMT with no assets and an entry level job. 18 years ago when I was 18 I wouldn't never have even looked into a policy like this but now I have more obligations and more assets to protect. I feel that the very minimal cost of the policy (48 dollars) does reflect the very long odds of my ever being sued, but lets face it long odds doesn't mean it won't ever happen.

Just my 2 cents :)
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Again, I am not disuading you from having it or anyone else to have it.

As far as attaching salary, I know in NY state, 5% can be attached for 20 years.

I know there are financial advisors that set up people of means to structure their financial matters in a way to make them judgement resistant.

I am not an expert in insurance, I just had a greater than average awareness of it.

Do you have a household umbrella liability policy? Ask the person who wrote it for you if it covers you acting in a professional capacity as an emt or paramedic.

Yes, there is no way to know if someone had insurance but there is a good way to guess. In NY state, there is always insurance to grab, even if the at fault party had no insurance. Lawyers know that and that is why they auto claims.

Buisness owneres need insurance to rent their space. Property owners need it to get a mortage.

Best example I can give you. A person rapes someone on a public street. There is damages/liability. The rapist gets arrested. There is a target. But 99.9% of lawyers will not take that case. They get a judgement but how will they collect. If ever....?

A person is at a supermarket, they get raped, the lawyer sues the rapist, the porperty owner, the laundrmat owner, the contract security guard company.

Google : jointly and severaly liable.

Based on the circumstances of the rape, the insurance companies will pay to get out of the cae. They will negotiate with the plaintiff lawyer the damages, and then amonst themselves the % of "blame".

Now the insurance companies will do this big investigation. They find out the rapist was the former boyfriend of the plaintiff, she told him she would be there, the case will settle but not for so much.

Now if the rapist was a former employee, fired for cause, and the staff saw him lurking around earlier in the day, they pretty much have to pay out the policy....and the plaintiff usually gets what the policy is, regardless of court judgement, the lawyer has no incentive or easy way to get more......
 
bigbaldguy said:
My policy actually has a much higher limit then the 100k/300k but only because it was no more expensive to do it that way. The idea that only people who have insurance are sued is debatable. By law an insurance company can not disclose if you have a policy with them. So a lawyer can't just call up insurance companies and ask if a defendant is insured. I agree though that if you don't have much in the way of assets then there is less need to have insurance. However what if you go on to become an RN or PA or even an MD. It is not unheard of for settlements to be attached to future earnings (admittedly I found no instances where this was done at a medic/emt level). More importantly because I have a good job that makes decent money I am by definition a better target of a lawsuit then say an 18 year old EMT with no assets and an entry level job. 18 years ago when I was 18 I wouldn't never have even looked into a policy like this but now I have more obligations and more assets to protect. I feel that the very minimal cost of the policy (48 dollars) does reflect the very long odds of my ever being sued, but lets face it long odds doesn't mean it won't ever happen.

Just my 2 cents :)
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Such a policy reminds me of flight insurance which I have not seen since the early 1990s. You pay $10 and your beneficiary receives 1 million if you die. The policy covers you for that one flight. They preyed on people's fears. Statistically your chances of dying on any one flight are nil. But when it does happen, the media over covers it (which logically should tell you that if the national media covers a commerical flight crash it rarely happens, do they cover car crashes nationwide...?) those policies gave psychological comfort.

There were friends of my parents who when travelling alone w/o kids would fly on separate flights so not to orphan their kids.....but they always drove together.....


Again, I advide you to keep and renew your policy. However, if you have a house and have or can get an all risks unbrella liability policy, ask if it covers you professionally.

I am really curious if this EMT/paramedic insurance company has ever had to defend or indemnify and emt/paramedic. They only charge $48. How many policies did they sell?

How much does a policy for an OBGYN MD cost ? I have heard some are in the six figures. That is because they defend and indemnify so many of them.
 
This company also insures RN's, nurse practitioners, physicians assistants and pharmacists to name a few. My mother is an RN here in Texas and her policy runs 143 dollars a year through the same company (for part time work she's in her 80's). My understanding on this type of insurance is that the longer you have been operating as a health care professional the more expensive it generally gets because you have more patient contacts over the years and hence more risk. For instance a OBGYN who has been in practice for lets say 18 years has 18 years worth of patients who could sue him whereas one who has been in practice 1 year only has 12 months worth of patients who might sue. At some point people like OBGYN's start paying some major cash. A friend of mine from high school pays 350ish dollars a year for his coverage (he is a dentist) but it was only 120 dollars his first year out of school. Mine will jump to about 100 dollars next year but so far as they have been able to tell me it won't rise much more than that unless I have a claim.
I do have an umbrella policy but I could not find any policies that cover me while working/volunteering. All of the ones I could find specifically exclude most events that occur while you are working in a health care related field. The only coverage my umbrella policy gives me is if I serve on the board of a non profit. My homeowners policy does give me some protection while volunteering but it is limited to 5000 dollars in medical expenses for the injured party and specifically excludes legal coverage costs. My auto policy also excludes coverage for accidents that occur while I am driving any emergency vehicle unless the vehicle is one that I am allowed to take home with me and I am not driving it while on duty (kind of a head scatcher I know)
Again check out this link as it has 10 or 12 case studies of EMS providers that have been sued for various things. Some won some lost but you can bet they all had to get lawyers (their employer probably paid for legal but what if you work for a shoestring outfit?).

http://www.hpso.com/case-studies/casestudy-index.jsf

I think we might be chasing each other in circles on this one but I do understand where you are coming from. I just think that the chance of an EMT being sued is unlikely but still far greater than being in a plane crash. I would be very interested to hear if anyone here has been named in a lawsuit or has first hand knowledge of someone who was named in a suit.
 
Out of curiosity I just ran a quote for a first year Nurse Practitioner in family practice working full time for an employer through HPSO. The quote came back at $2,130.50 for a 3,000,000/6,000,000 dollar policy :o ouch!

This company does not insure MD's so I couldn't get a quote for an OB/GYN but for a Nurse Practitioner in the OB/GYN field it came back with 2,615.50 for the premium so not too big a difference. Just for comparison the premium for a regular RN is $252.50.
 
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bigbaldguy said:
Out of curiosity I just ran a quote for a first year Nurse Practitioner in family practice working full time for an employer through HPSO. The quote came back at $2,130.50 for a 3,000,000/6,000,000 dollar policy :o ouch!

This company does not insure MD's so I couldn't get a quote for an OB/GYN but for a Nurse Practitioner in the OB/GYN field it came back with 2,615.50 for the premium so not too big a difference. Just for comparison the premium for a regular RN is $252.50.
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That is my point. Its all statistics.

My company, almost 20 years ago, billed around $65/hour for investigators. I saw lawyers bill at $400/hour.
 
bigbaldguy said:
This company also insures RN's, nurse practitioners, physicians assistants and pharmacists to name a few. My mother is an RN here in Texas and her policy runs 143 dollars a year through the same company (for part time work she's in her 80's). My understanding on this type of insurance is that the longer you have been operating as a health care professional the more expensive it generally gets because you have more patient contacts over the years and hence more risk. For instance a OBGYN who has been in practice for lets say 18 years has 18 years worth of patients who could sue him whereas one who has been in practice 1 year only has 12 months worth of patients who might sue. At some point people like OBGYN's start paying some major cash. A friend of mine from high school pays 350ish dollars a year for his coverage (he is a dentist) but it was only 120 dollars his first year out of school. Mine will jump to about 100 dollars next year but so far as they have been able to tell me it won't rise much more than that unless I have a claim.
I do have an umbrella policy but I could not find any policies that cover me while working/volunteering. All of the ones I could find specifically exclude most events that occur while you are working in a health care related field. The only coverage my umbrella policy gives me is if I serve on the board of a non profit. My homeowners policy does give me some protection while volunteering but it is limited to 5000 dollars in medical expenses for the injured party and specifically excludes legal coverage costs. My auto policy also excludes coverage for accidents that occur while I am driving any emergency vehicle unless the vehicle is one that I am allowed to take home with me and I am not driving it while on duty (kind of a head scatcher I know)
Again check out this link as it has 10 or 12 case studies of EMS providers that have been sued for various things. Some won some lost but you can bet they all had to get lawyers (their employer probably paid for legal but what if you work for a shoestring outfit?).

http://www.hpso.com/case-studies/casestudy-index.jsf

I think we might be chasing each other in circles on this one but I do understand where you are coming from. I just think that the chance of an EMT being sued is unlikely but still far greater than being in a plane crash. I would be very interested to hear if anyone here has been named in a lawsuit or has first hand knowledge of someone who was named in a suit.
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Some policies cover you for events in a certain period. Most auto or general libaility policies are like that. Some policies are claims made, they cover you when a claim is made. And that depends on statute of limitiations, which is 3 years in NYS, past the age of 21 (I think).

I saw cases for things happened to people 15 years ago as a child.

I promise to read through the link later.

I am curious if those EMS people were defended and indemnified by their employers or by personal coverage. If they did not have personal coverage, did they have a personal attorney.

Most case studies address liability issues, damages issues, but not coverage issues. Coverage issues are complicated, a whole other area of insurance.

Just a tidbit, with auto cases, in NYS there is viacrious liability, the owner of the car is on the hook even if her or she was never driving.

When I had a car, I gave people rides, but I NEVER lent it out.
 
Another tidbit, there are ways to structure one's assets to prevent them being attached.

If you gift moeny to your children, they can not attach it.

Certain retirement accounts can not be attached.

And of course, there are ways to shelter and hide assets and lawyers that specialize in just that.
 
You crazy New Yorkers and your Yankee ways :) Down here in Texas we just A HOLLAR OUT DA WINDAW "SORRY YA'LL" and drive on. :beerchug:
 
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