From Emergency Medicine News
The largest EMTALA settlement in the controversial statute’s 30-year history has had a surprising effect: The number of EMTALA fines have doubled.
The Office of Inspector General (OIG) reported just nine violation settlements in 2017 but eight this year from January to May. This uptick in enforcement may be the OIG’s renewed focus on regulation because of the AnMed Health case, a $1.295 million settlement for failure to stabilize an emergency medical condition. Thirty-six patients at the Anderson, SC, hospital deemed by the emergency physician to have a psychiatric emergency were not admitted to the hospital’s inpatient psychiatry unit, but were boarded in the emergency department (one for 38 days) until transport to the county’s inpatient psychiatric facility. (OIG, June 23, 2017; http://bit.ly/2tzhN6E.)
Read the complete article here: At Your Defense: Think You Know All about EMTALA? Think Again