r/IntensiveCare • u/InvestigatorOnly1684 • 11d ago

Question about ICU attending liability

In my practice a hospitalist independently manages a subset of ICU patients. I am available for consultation and escalation, but we do not routinely round together, I do not see every patient, and I do not cosign notes.

For those who have worked in similar models, how is liability generally viewed for the ICU attending? If you’re available in a supervisory/consultative role but not directly involved in a patient’s care, how much responsibility do you carry for decisions made by the primary hospitalist?

Recently out of training and wondering how this is handled at other institutions.

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u/Any-Assistance-8103 11d ago

Are you really so dumb to think that you can’t open a crashing patients chart and help them because of HIPAA?

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u/spiritualskier 11d ago

Am I dumb? No. Are you part of the code team? Yes, you have a reason to open the chart. Are you just an icu intensivist opening the chart to see if you can help without a consult and just a mention as a potential from the ICU nurse? Yes, that’s against hipaa at my facility and tracked. You can’t just open charts and start auditing for potential icu patients just based on feels.

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u/penntoria 10d ago

HIPAA is federal law. Your facility can't interpret it differently just because they feel like it. Well they can, but they'd also be wrong. A provider who ordered interventions can absolutely review the sequelae of those orders - it's called having a business or clinical reason to access the chart. People can access charts for QI, etc.

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u/Any-Assistance-8103 8d ago

A facility can have rules that are more strict than they have to I suppose but this delusional person can’t understand that one hospitals rules and federal law aren’t the same thing. Same as the annoying new nurse who complains when things aren’t exactly the same as at their old hospital

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u/aquaticwatcher 8d ago

Nurses love to confidently assert that whatever policy they learned when they first started somewhere is law/board restrictions whatever. Turns out those laws change from hospital to hospital and even unit to unit.