QUESTION:
Our hospital recently employed a small group of urologists.  The hospital wanted more control over the group’s on-site hours and scheduling.  While three of the urologists are great culture fits, there was concern about one group member whose behavior with staff has raised eyebrows in the past, but no action was ever taken.  There was an incident last week in the cafeteria where this troublesome urologist allegedly yelled and confronted one of our hospital administrators.  The administrator wants to deescalate the situation and hasn’t filed a complaint, but how should we as a medical staff handle the matter and should we work with the hospital as the urologist’s employer?

OUR ANSWER FROM HORTYSPRINGER ATTORNEY JOHN WIECZOREK:
This is an excellent question and the administrator’s response is completely understandable, but the best practice in this situation is to follow your Medical Staff Professionalism Policy.  If medical staff leaders become aware that a practitioner’s behavior in the hospital may be inconsistent with the expectations for medical staff members, the leadership can and should review that behavior under the Professionalism Policy.  The review by the medical staff leadership is not dependent on the administrator filing a complaint.

The Professionalism Policy should require that appropriate fact-finding take place and that the urologist has an opportunity to provide input.  This fact-finding and input will allow the medical staff leaders to understand the context in which the dispute occurred.  Review of the urologist’s behavior should not be in isolation, and if the previous issues alluded to in your question have been recorded, medical staff leadership should be using those to provide context to the fact-finding.  The question for your medical staff leadership would be whether there’s a behavioral trend that needs to be addressed via collegial intervention, a performance improvement plan, or other means.

As for working with the urologist’s employer, the hospital, we highly recommend doing so.  While the medical staff’s final action and the employer’s final action regarding the confrontation are independent of each other, the fact-finding process of each can be beneficial to the other.  Within proper channels, the sharing of information can allow both the employer and your medical staff to make a more informed disposition of the urologist’s confrontational behavior.

If you have a quick question about this, e-mail John Wieczorek at jwieczorek@hortyspringer.com.