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So I recently had a situation where a patient was acting very inappropriately with my front desk staff and became belligerent towards both the staff and other patients in our waiting room. The provider that they were scheduled with refused to see them -- our intervention team got them calmed down and wound up asking me if I would pretty please with sugar on top see them --- I agreed to it and the visit went well.
Afterwards, I was having a rather blunt discussion with the powers that be and was told:
1) We have to at least perform a medical assessment on all patients due to EMTALA.
2) An interpreter has to be provided if the patient is non-English speaking -- usually a family member will accompany them and in our situation, Spanish is the more frequent non-English language and plenty of MAs are bilingual (note: not medical interpreters but bilingual).
Can anyone shed some light on the application of EMTALA to an FM office -- I thought it only applied to ERs?
Same with the interpreter thing?
Afterwards, I was having a rather blunt discussion with the powers that be and was told:
1) We have to at least perform a medical assessment on all patients due to EMTALA.
2) An interpreter has to be provided if the patient is non-English speaking -- usually a family member will accompany them and in our situation, Spanish is the more frequent non-English language and plenty of MAs are bilingual (note: not medical interpreters but bilingual).
Can anyone shed some light on the application of EMTALA to an FM office -- I thought it only applied to ERs?
Same with the interpreter thing?