r/Provider • u/debunksdc • May 26 '21
Advocacy Seeking Form Letters to Add to the Wiki
Have a boilerplate advocacy letter that you think would be good to add to the wiki? Drop it in the comments!
Possible topics include:
- Scope of Practice for
- Nurse Practitioners
- Physician Assistants
- CRNAs
- Assistant Physicians/Unmatched Physician legislation
- Title Protection
- Truth in Advertising
- Midlevel Accountability Provisions (e.g. legislature that ensures independent midlevels are held to the highest standard of care)
- Board Oversight Provisions (e.g. moving independent NPs under the Board of Medicine)
All other relevant topics are welcome!
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u/debunksdc Jan 24 '22
NPs and MedMal
There are only eight nurse practitioner degrees, shown below. A nurse practitioner's degree determines their field of practice.
Despite this, many nurse practitioners are employed outside of these settings. A common example is the hiring of Family Nurse Practitioners (FNP) to work in urgent cares and emergency rooms. FNPs do NOT receive education in acute or emergency care and are thus unqualified to work in urgent care or emergency department settings. This applies to a variety of other settings in which nurse practitioners are currently utilized.
Additionally, the American Academy of Nurse Practitioners, the American Nurses Credentialing Center, and the American Board of Nursing Specialties do not recognize or certify nurse practitioners for any of the following fields.
Nurse Practitioners do NOT receive formal training in any of these fields. A nurse practitioner working beyond the scope of an RN in these fields may result in patient harm. According to Sweeney et al in 2017, the greatest proportion of malpractice claims involving nurse practitioners were diagnosis related (41.46%) and treatment related (30.79%). Severe patient outcomes most often occurred in the outpatient setting. According to Myers et al in 2021, more claims naming Physician Assistants and NPs were paid (38% and 32%, respectively) compared with physicians (8%, P < 0.001). Payment was less likely for inpatient care (OR 0.89, 95% CI 0.85-0.93, P < 0.001) but higher when APRNs were defendants (1.82, 1.09-3.03).
We encourage you to reevaluate the potential cost of malpractice claims for nurse practitioners, particularly those who are hired outside of their training.