Your First Chair Job
An increase in uninsured patients who show up in emergency departments (EDs), physician specialty shortages, and a physician population unwilling to take call all have led to a now-common practice: hospitals pay physician-specialists for on-call coverage of their EDs.
Though essential for providing adequate emergency care, this hospital-physician arrangement can violate anti-kickback laws. But recently, one hospital’s payments to on-call physicians was given an official federal stamp of approval. What does this official statement mean for hospital medicine groups and the hospitalists they employ?
Origins of the Opinion
In September 2007, the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) issued an advisory opinion that a hospital that pays physicians for providing on-call and indigent care services in the ED does not violate the federal anti-kickback statute.
An unnamed medical center requested the opinion and submitted details on the comprehensive, detailed program it had created to ensure coverage of the ED.
The hospital’s program includes varied payment structures for staff physicians based on their participation in an on-call schedule for the ED and provision of inpatient follow-up care to patients seen while on call, among other actions.
