UofM Business Law Insurance Law Essay

1. Write a report about your topic. The report must be at least four pages, double-spaced, 12-point font, and standard margins.
2. Your report should contain the following content.Answer the career-application question, How is knowledge of this area of law useful to your particular career field? Be specific and provide details here.— (Insurance Law related to Health administration)Discuss at least three subtopics related to your topic. For example, if your report were on intellectual property, your three subtopics might be trademarks, patents, and copyrights. personalize your report to match your research interests.
3. Cite three sources
4. Insurance Law Is the main topic, My report subtopics on Insurance Law are insurance regulation, characteristics of contracts, and legal liability
5. laws related to health insurance. Health Coverage Guide by Small Business Majority. (n.d.). Retrieved February 10, 2022, from https://healthcoverageguide.org/reference-guide/laws-and-rights/laws-related-to-health-insurance/Goodell, S. (2022, June 15). Types of Health Insurance Plans: HMO, PPO, HSA, fee for service, pos. WebMD. Retrieved February 10, 2022, from https://www.webmd.com/health-insurance/types-of-health-insurance-plansStaff, F. L. (2021, November 25). Health Insurance and benefits: Your rights. Findlaw. Retrieved February 10, 2022, from https://www.findlaw.com/employment/wages-and-benefits/health-insurance-and-benefits-your-rights.html

Sample draft attached

Health Care Law
Student’s Name Here
(Instructor’s Note: This topic is no longer available for the Legal Topic Report. While
this particular sample demonstrates how to format your report, you will need to include
several more in-text citations than this student did. Every fact and opinion that you gain
from outside your own knowledge requires an in-text citation to a source listed in your
reference page.)
Health care law is very interesting but is often found to be very confusing to the
average Joe. There are so many different parts and aspects to it that most people do
not understand completely (I am one of those people). So much of health care law
happens behind the scenes and is something that you are not even aware of. Each
doctor’s visit, dentist appointment, physical therapy visit, and any other appointment you
have that may pertain to your health may be covered by insurance. After each
appointment the insurance company works to authorize payment for that particular visit
and you are asked to pay your co-pay for that appointment or deductible (depending on
the insurance that you have).
There are three different subtopics that I am going to touch on in this paper: (1)
insurance issues, (2) the Affordable Care Act, and (3) medical marijuana. All three of
these topics are important in terms of where we are headed as a society and are some
things that you would really benefit from knowing.
CAREER APPLICATION
I chose to do my report on health care law because I am dual majoring in
business and physical therapy and I currently have a job as a rehab technician in
physical therapy. My goal is to open up my own physical therapy clinic and work in the
health field. I have a very limited knowledge base of health care law and seeing as it is
a field that I am actively pursuing, I am taking this as a great opportunity to learn more
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about what is involved with health care law. Knowledge about health care law is
extremely useful towards my career choice because I am going into the medical field.
INSURANCE
The insurance companies always seem to be hounding us and wanting to know
how the patients are doing to see if they are making enough progress to continue with
therapy. We must treat patients carefully in order to not harm them further. Medical
malpractice is something that physical therapists have to deal with as well, although it is
not a very common charge that is brought up. Most patients know that physical
therapists are trying to help them out but sometimes a mistake is made in treatment,
something that the physical therapist knows they shouldn’t have done to a patient at the
risk of further injury directly applies to this. If a physical therapist is treating a patient and
further injures them while directly treating them, this would fall under medical
malpractice and a lawsuit could be filed (Boeschen, 2017).
Negligence is another issue that we have to deal with and an example of
negligence could be something as simple as accidently dropping a weight on a patient’s
foot and breaking their toe. Although you didn’t mean to drop that weight, it still
happened and the therapist is held responsible. It is very important that I have a strong
knowledge base about all of this so that I am aware that at any given moment a lawsuit
could be filed. In some ways, medical malpractice can change the way in which you
treat a patient. You may just take the safe route in treatment instead of trying something
new that could be a little risky. However, before you do anything, you must
communicate with the patient what you are about to do in order to get their permission.
In many cases, this could avoid a lawsuit entirely. The more you communicate and the
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safer you treat the patients, the happier the patient will be, as well as the insurance
companies that are trying to get their clients to progress enough to complete the therapy
process.
One thing that is huge in health care law as well as physical therapy is insurance.
Insurance policies, as well as the type of insurance coverage and the many different
insurance companies all differ in many ways. I have gotten a lot of first-hand knowledge
of this since beginning my job at ATI Physical Therapy. For physical therapy, they make
their money from insurance companies. Going into a field like physical therapy, I really
need to know health care law and some different aspects to it. A few problems that I
notice fairly consistently at ATI is insurances not covering additional visits for many
patients. Many insurances will authorize a set amount of visits, and once those visits are
up, the patient must be either discharged or get another script from their doctor in order
to continue. This is an issue that we see far more often than we would like. Another
issue is that there are certain insurance companies that we are not able to take which
places a burden on the patient. There are also some insurance companies that require
one on one patient to clinician care, meaning that there cannot be multiple patients in at
that time or we won’t get paid for that patients visit. It’s many little things like that, that
we have to deal with everyday which can confuse a person about insurance companies
and what they are out to do.
AFFORDABLE CARE ACT
Health care is such a big deal because in the majority of states it is a requirement
to have health insurance. The Affordable Care Act, (ACA) for short, is the new health
care reform law in America and often called by its nickname “Obamacare” is one of the
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cheapest health coverage plans. It is mainly used amongst those with the lowest
income in our society. There is also many different things that can be done for the
affordable care act and how it affects small businesses. This act is a way in which small
businesses are able to give out benefits such as health insurance to their employees
without it being a huge cost to them. There are many rules about it however; the health
care law requires you to provide certain information about the marketplace to your
employees, whether you offer health insurance or not. Another rule is the “90 day rule”
this rule requires that if you offer out health insurance to your employees, you must offer
it to all eligible employees within 90 days of their start date (Healthcare, n.d.).
Patient protection is another very important part of health care law. There are
many different protocols that must be met to ensure that someone’s medical information
does not get into the wrong hands. Another big thing that many people have become
familiar with are HIPAA Laws. HIPAA stands for health insurance portability and
accountability act. The physician must communicate with the patient what their
treatment strategy is going to be and then the patient will sign the HIPAA clause and
that prevents the physician or any other medical providers from disclosing the patient’s
records without his or her consent. In physical therapy, we have a form that we give all
patients. If the patients willingly sign the form then they consent to us giving out some
information to certain people if they call and ask for it. If they don’t sign this form, it
means they do not consent and we cannot give away any of their information, even if
the person calling is a parent or spouse. Giving patients the option to sign the HIPAA
clause allows the patient to feel comfortable knowing that it is their decision. It also
helps the physical therapy clinic feel good knowing that they can’t get in trouble
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because they consented with the patient. Patient consent is something that is not taken
lightly and for good reason. If the wrong person were to get ahold of your records, you
could be in a lot of trouble.
MEDICAL MARIJUANA
Medical marijuana has been gaining a lot of steam recently and is legal in most
states. There are even some states that have deemed marijuana legal for recreational
purposes (Washington and Colorado). In Michigan, medical marijuana is legal so long
as you get written documentation from your doctor that you need the drug for medical
purposes. In December of 2016, medical marijuana dispensaries were placed in cities.
Many people believe that medical marijuana is acceptable as a form of treatment
because it is used as a pain reliever as well as a form of treatment for many conditions
such as glaucoma, AIDS, epilepsy and cancer. There are many laws pertaining to
medical marijuana that I’m sure you could guess because marijuana is still an illegal
drug in most states. In order to get medical marijuana, you need a note from your doctor
and then you must receive your medical marijuana card. Each time you go to pick up
the drug, there is only a certain amount that you can get to ensure that you are not
abusing the drug (Findlaw, 2017). Medical marijuana helps many people but often
time’s people will try to get a medical marijuana card when they do not have an illness,
which is where the problem lies. So many people try to take advantage of the system
and if this continues to happen, there are going to be more harsh punishments. Even if
you have your medical marijuana card, it doesn’t mean you are in the clear. There are
still ways that you could get in trouble, such as having more marijuana than you were
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prescribed. Medical marijuana is used for treatment and to relieve pain, not for
recreational use and that is what people need to understand.
Health care law is very important in today’s society and it’s something that the
majority of people don’t quite understand, although I think people could really benefit
from knowing how some of these things work. In just the past 10 years, a lot of this
information is new. The Medicaid and Medicare policies are both fairly new as well as
medical marijuana. They both have their advantages and disadvantages. I work with
Medicare and Medicaid patients every single day in physical therapy so I have a good
idea about what goes on with it. The HIPAA clause I have become very familiar with as
well.
Overall, I really enjoyed doing some research to write this paper. I had a slim
understanding of many things in the medical field and just from talking to other physical
therapists and physicians and with the writing of this research paper, my knowledge
base has grown exponentially. I learned some valuable things about health care laws
that I will be able to take with me in the future and it will serve me better when working
in the physical therapy field.
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References
1. How the Affordable Care Act affects small businesses. (n.d.). Retrieved April 16,
2016, from https://www.healthcare.gov/small-businesses/health-care-law-andbusinesses/how-aca-affects-businesses/
2. Boeschen, C. (2017). Can a Physical Therapist Be Sued for Malpractice?
Retrieved April 17, 2017, from http://www.alllaw.com/articles/nolo/medicalmalpractice/physical-therapist-sued.html
3. Medical Marijuana – An Overview. (2017). Retrieved April 17, 2017, from
http://criminal.findlaw.com/criminal-charges/medical-marijuana-an-overview.html
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