Collaborative agreement details allied workers' duties

Contract Language. By Steven M. Harris, AMNews contributor. Dec. 11, 2006.

CONTRACT LANGUAGE

A column examining the ins and outs of contract issues

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Recently a physician asked me to review a proposed collaborative agreement between his practice and an advanced-practice nurse who was hired to treat patients during extended office hours and at off-site locations, including hospitals and extended care facilities.

Collaborative agreements typically set forth the conditions and qualifications in the contractual collaborative relationship between the practice group and an ancillary service provider, which might include a nurse practitioner, physician assistant or certified registered nurse anesthetist.

Many states have regulations that specifically govern such collaborative relationships. Such regulations often address clinical practice, including medical direction, supervision, consultation and prescriptive authority.

The written collaborative agreement should also address the services the collaborating physician generally provides to his patients in the course of his practice, and the medical direction that shall be provided to the ancillary service provider.

The physician group practice I represent had recently hired the nurse practitioner, and an employment agreement was signed by both parties. The nurse practitioner gave my client a copy of a collaborative agreement that she previously had executed with a hospital. The contract appeared to be the standard collaborative agreement that the hospital executed with all of the ancillary service providers who delivered patient care at the hospital and its related entities.