I am speaking to a potential employer who has an interest in adding physical therapy services to his practice. The physican knows of several other practices who utilize non-licensed therapists who are essentially taught by a physician on how to perform basic PT techniques on patients. The doctor is interested in having me (as a physiatrist) to train these "therapists" and supervise them. This is the first I have heard of such a setup, and I wanted to know if anybody else knows of or has had experiences with this?
Utilizing non-licensed "therapists" to perform PT
- Thread starter nwbgn
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It is done, and then billed under the physician's #. Some insurances will not cover non-licensed personnel doing PT, so you would need to check with each payer.
Medicare will need to be researched by you as it varies by region. In general, you can do it, but it must meet strict "supervision" requirements.
Medicare will need to be researched by you as it varies by region. In general, you can do it, but it must meet strict "supervision" requirements.
Sorry about my flippant reply.
IMO the easiest way to get into trouble is to be greedy. There are a lot of greedy doctors, and as soon as you start looking at ways to expand your services beyond what you are trained to do, you run the risk of an audit that you cannot defend yourself through. Are you a trained PT? What school did you graduate from? These are the questions the attorneys will be asking during a malpractice deposition.
The standard you need to meet when billing a govt. program (Tricare, MCR, Caid) is that the billing provider either a) did the procedure themself or b) had direct line of sight supervision to do the procedure. If instead you are directly employing another licensed provider to do said service, then you are in violation of Stark (unless you meet the whole hospital or whole practice exclusion).
If you do not completely understand this stuff, do not get involved. Your employer will not be the person fined. It will be you.
IMO the easiest way to get into trouble is to be greedy. There are a lot of greedy doctors, and as soon as you start looking at ways to expand your services beyond what you are trained to do, you run the risk of an audit that you cannot defend yourself through. Are you a trained PT? What school did you graduate from? These are the questions the attorneys will be asking during a malpractice deposition.
The standard you need to meet when billing a govt. program (Tricare, MCR, Caid) is that the billing provider either a) did the procedure themself or b) had direct line of sight supervision to do the procedure. If instead you are directly employing another licensed provider to do said service, then you are in violation of Stark (unless you meet the whole hospital or whole practice exclusion).
If you do not completely understand this stuff, do not get involved. Your employer will not be the person fined. It will be you.
i dont get it. why doesnt the boss hire a physical therapist to train these non-licensed therapists? seems a lot cheaper to me.
also, i would think your time be better spent seeing patients.
No problem. You are correct in that I did not completely understand this stuff and that is why I asked. Common sense had immediately brought several potential legal issues to mind, just as you described above. I had already let him know that I did not think that such an arrangement would be suitable as I would rather spend time on better things (such as direct patient care), and would rather not take on legal responsibility should a patient get injured as a result of a non-licensed therapist.
