Should I Carry Medical Malpractice Protection as a Nurse?

“Should I carry medical malpractice protection?” is the question on the lips of most nurses. And the right answer is YES. You need medical malpractice insurance.

The importance of good personal coverage as a nurse can’t be overemphasized. This is most necessary especially when you change to a new job and your former employer’s liability insurance no longer covers you.

What is Malpractice?

Malpractice is the failure of a nurse, physician, attorney, or any professional to adhere to a standard code of conduct or care.

Medical malpractice occurs when it can be proven that the professional had a duty to provide a standard of care, breached that duty, an injury or damage resulted, and the injury/damage was caused by the breach.

Unintentional mistakes can occur notwithstanding how confident, educated, or extremely careful a nurse is. It could happen as an accident or willful neglect. In fact, most injuries and death if well verified are a result of medical negligence, mistake, or accident.

Seeing how this can negatively affect their one-time perfect professional reputation and personal assets, nurses do everything to protect themselves using individual liability insurance coverage.

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Is My Employer’s Policy Not Enough as a Nurse?

Because your employer covers you doesn’t mean that you won’t need your own medical malpractice protection. Yes, your employer’s policy is not enough because theirs is there to do just one thing – and that is, to protect their interest first over your own personal interest.

Even if the human resource manager of your employer tells you that you don’t need to have your own policy, don’t bank on that. They do that because they don’t want you to hire an external representative in case something goes wrong and you have to sue or get sued.

Does the Medical Malpractice Liability Insurance Policies of My Employer Have a Limit?

Yes, all malpractice liability insurance policies have limits of liability. If you are only covered by your employer’s insurance, other defendants employed at your entity may and probably do share your liability limits under the same policy. If you, as well as others, are named in a suit, your legal costs, including any settlement, could exceed your employer’s shared liability limits. This would mean out-of-pocket expenses for you.

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• When Do You Need to Get Liability Coverage for Your Consultancy?
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