There are many ways that a psychologist can lose his or her license, including false claims, allegations of boundary violations, breaches of confidentiality, and many more. When psychologists come to my office because a state licensing board is investigating them, I often find myself providing them a laundry list of conduct that is viewed negatively by investigators. I have turned that overview into the following blog post.

If you are a psychologist in Kansas or Missouri facing an allegation of misconduct or an investigation, call attorney Sanger today at 785-979-4353 to schedule a free consultation. Your career, reputation, and livelihood are at risk, and the challenge facing you is one you cannot work your way through alone.

Ethical Considerations for Psychologists

Psychologists are acutely aware of the sensitive nature of their profession.  I often find, however, that their instinct to help their clients overrides their survival instinct, meaning that psychologists too often ignore warning signs in their psychologist-patient relationship that could lead to licensing issues later.  When allegations arise, regardless of how serious they seem at the time, your best move is to contact a licensing attorney immediately to make sure that those concerns do not end up costing you your career.

Relationships with patients often doom a psychologist’s career. Providing psychological or counseling services to a romantic partner, business partner, or friend is the most common cause of allegations of misconduct, especially when the psychologist used the relationship with the client to better him or herself financially.  Refrain from any sexual conduct with clients, even after the psychologist-client relationship is terminated. While you may be able to compartmentalize different aspects of your relationship with a client, they are unlikely to see the relationship similarly.

Never breach a client’s confidentiality. Obviously, this means not sharing information from their session with third parties you bump into socially, but it also means only providing insurance companies, employers, and others with a “need to know” only the minimum amount of information.

Be very clear with clients about billing. I find that misconduct violations can arise from billing issues, as clients tend to view a psychologist negatively if he or she believes that the psychologist is stealing money from them.  Be clear about how billing will occur, what services will be billed for, and rates you charge.  A client should not be surprised when he or she receives your bill for services.

Stay within your area of expertise.  Do not let the prospect of a new client lure you into practicing outside your area of professional expertise.  If you are not familiar with the problems your client seeks help for, advise them of other psychologists in your community that can serve them. You are far more likely to make mistakes if you are practicing in an unfamiliar area of psychology.

Contact an Experienced Kansas and Missouri Licensing Attorney Now

Your life as a psychologist is not only a richly rewarding career, but it’s your identity in your community—you have worked too hard to attain your license to practice to lose it.  Contact an experienced licensing attorney to help you through the misconduct hearing process, explain the implications of any allegations against you—that call can mean the difference between getting back to helping your patients and losing your career forever. Don’t let claims of misconduct end your career as a psychologist prematurely.

Kansas and Missouri professional licensing attorney Danielle Sanger is prepared to advocate for your best interests and defend your psychology license. Call Attorney Sanger at 785-979-4353 to schedule a free consultation with an attorney experienced dealing with licensing issues.

Given the rise of the “#metoo” era, I am contacted by physicians concerned about false allegations of sexual assault. As a physician, your license to practice in Kansas or Missouri is the product of a lifetime of education and hard work, so it is terrifying to think that a false misconduct allegation could quickly take your livelihood away. Physicians are particularly vulnerable to this sort of claim, as they frequently see patients privately, examine patients’ genitalia, and often see patients in situations requiring the patient to be at least partially undressed. When you couple those facts with the recent controversy regarding a physician’s outrageous abuse of gymnasts who sought his treatment at Michigan State University and patients’ varying degrees of mental stability, it is not hard to imagine how false claims arise.

If you are physician in Kansas or Missouri facing professional discipline, you must avoid going through the administrative hearing alone. Instead, call attorney Sanger today at 785-979-4353 to schedule a free consultation with an attorney experienced dealing with the administrative process required to defend you. Your career is simply worth too much to go it alone.

Expert defense of your license in Kansas or Missouri is the key to continuing your entire career. Without it, you stand to lose your practice, your financial security and your reputation.

Criminal, Civil, and Administrative Matters

There is a significant difference between criminal, civil, and administrative investigations into an allegation of sexual assault.  The problem is that they all overlap and influence each other, so you need an attorney to make sure that a success in one venue does not have the unintended consequence of harming you in another.

A criminal case is investigated by the police and prosecuted by the district attorney or prosecutor. If you have watched crime shows on television, you are familiar with this sort of investigation. Ultimately, a criminal investigation for sexual assault has penalties that include jail and fines. To prove a criminal case, the district attorney must prove his or her case “beyond a reasonable doubt.”

A civil case is a lawsuit between two individuals. A former patient could sue you and he or she would have an attorney that would present the case on their behalf. A civil case has a lower standard of proof, and a plaintiff only has to prove sexual assault “by a preponderance of the evidence” or just over 50%. Penalties are financial.

An administrative case is a hybrid of criminal and civil matters. It is brought by the state and prosecuted by an attorney general.  The case uses “preponderance” standard, but the penalties are financial and the suspension or revocation of a medical license.

The Problem When Criminal, Civil, or Administrative Matters Overlap

Often, when a physician is facing either a criminal, civil, or administrative investigation, the inquiry will result in one of the other processes being triggered as well.  You likely have heard the phrase “you have the right to remain silent, anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law” if you have ever watched a crime drama. The same is true here and can be disastrous if not heeded.

For example, imagine a former patient filed criminal charges against her doctor for sexual assault. Sexual assault is commonly defined as using force or coercion to engage non-consensual sexual intercourse with another person. In the course of the police investigation, the doctor may defend himself by saying that while he did have sex with the patient in his office, it was consensual. Follow up visits from the patient could may establish that she was not afraid of the doctor and wanted to continue the relationship.

Imagine that the prosecutor believed the physician above and dropped the charges. While that is a good outcome in the criminal case, it may be extremely problematic in ensuing action to suspend the physician’s license. The doctor’s admission to consensual sex with a patient under his care may be used against him in the administrative matter and may lead to a suspension, revocation, or other penalty. The admission may also come back to haunt the physician if the patient either sues him for sexual assault civilly, which has a lower burden of proof, or for some sort of infliction of emotional harm.

Accordingly, you need to understand that criminal, civil, and administrative processes all overlap in ways that may not be intuitive. If you are facing discipline in any one of these areas, you need expert help from a licensing attorney immediately.

Contact an Experienced Kansas and Missouri Licensing Attorney Now

You deserve to be practicing medicine without the fear. Contacting an experienced licensing attorney to help you through any of these processes can mean the difference between getting back to your practice quickly and a suspension or revocation.

If you are a physician in Kansas or Missouri and are worried about misconduct costing you your career, call attorney Sanger now.

Kansas and Missouri professional licensing attorney Danielle Sanger is prepared to advocate for your best interests and defend your livelihood and career. Call Attorney Sanger at 785-979-4353 to schedule a free consultation with an attorney experienced dealing with physician licensing issues.

Receiving a subpoena—a legal request for your documents or for your presence at a formal, recorded interview—is often a first clue that there may be a claim against you. The records you deal with on a daily basis are often the foundation of a patient’s lawsuit against you or your hospital.  But how should you respond to receiving a subpoena for those records?

Why Would You Be Subpoenaed?

If you are being subpoenaed, something you did is of interest to a party in a lawsuit. It does not necessarily mean that you have done something wrong or that you are personally being sued, A subpoena can be a request for documents—a subpoena duces tecum—or for your presence at a recorded interview.  This blog post is concerned with the subpoena duces tecum, a request for records. This sort of subpoena usually requests your treatment records regarding a patient or patients.

A subpoena duces tecum can either be made in the context of a trial or in the context of “discovery,” which is the legal process through with parties exchange information preceding a trial. In the end, both types of subpoena duces tecum are just looking for documents, but the level of certification of accuracy in a trial subpoena is higher.

If you are subpoenaed, contacting an experienced attorney can help you determine whether you should respond, what documents you should provide, and whether the subpoena is something that should cause you professional concern. Attorney Sanger is experienced in providing medical professionals in Kansas and Missouri this sort of review and advice.

Do I Always Have to Respond to a Subpoena?

When you receive a subpoena, it will say the court that has jurisdiction over it and the parties that are in a legal dispute.  it will also which party sent it, and what documents they want you to produce. After reviewing that information, the question is, do you have to respond?

If you receive a subpoena from an out of state party or court, you are likely not subject to their jurisdiction and may not have a duty to respond. Deciding that you do not have to respond is not a simple decision, nor is one to be made lightly.  Contact an attorney with experience representing medical professionals if you are unsure about whether you are subject to a subpoena’s jurisdiction.

Similarly, if the subpoena requests a patient’s protected health information or PHI, you may be legally prevented from providing the information by HIPAA. If the subpoena seeks PHI, it should have an accompanying HIPAA release allowing disclosure. If it does not, you should not provide any PHI until you receive one.

How Long Do I Have To Respond?

How long you have to respond to a subpoena depends on what type it is.  If it is a trial subpoena, meaning there is an active trial underway, you may only have a few days to respond. However, if you have a discovery subpoena, you will likely have weeks.  In either circumstance, you should not just provide documents because you feel time pressure.  You can usually negotiate for more time if you need it, and it is a good idea to have counsel reach out on your behalf.

If you are a medical professional in Kansas or Missouri and are facing a threat to your license, call Danielle Sanger today.

Only an experienced attorney can determine whether a subpoena duces tecum is a routine request for information from a broad class of individuals or a prelude to an attack on you, your licensure as a medical professional, and your livelihood. Having experienced counsel help you through this process is vital. Receiving a subpoena begins a legally-intensive response process. It is important to proceed with caution and to attain skilled legal counsel to help you find the best path forward.

Kansas Professional Licensing Attorney Danielle Sanger is prepared to advocate for your best interests and defend your livelihood and career. Call Attorney Sanger today at 785-979-4353 to schedule a free consultation with an experienced and aggressive attorney for medical professionals.

More and more studies have shown that oral hygiene and good oral health are a vital component of our overall well-being. Therefore, dentists, dental assistants, and dental hygienists help keep us healthy in conjunction with our primary care physicians and other healthcare professionals upon whom we rely. All professionals within the dental field are educated and licensed professionals dedicated to their craft. However, dentists, dental hygienists, and dental assistants (collectively “dentists”) make mistakes just as fallible humans do, despite having their patient’s best interest in mind. That is why dentists who are facing professional discipline need an experienced, aggressive, and successful advocate for dental professionals in Kansas and Missouri like Danielle Sanger, Esq.

Attorney Danielle Sanger has dedicated her practice to representing professional licensees before professional boards and administrative agencies. Her passion for helping professional licensees differentiates Attorney Sanger from other attorneys. She has over a decade of experience defending clients facing license loss. Additionally, her experience as an Assistant Attorney General prosecuting professional license matters before the Kansas Board of Nursing gives her clients an added advantage. Attorney Sanger understands how the system works and how best to represent her clients within those strictures.

Those who work in the dental profession are well-regarded as intelligent individuals. Therefore, it would be tempting for them to try to take on the government and represent themselves before the Board of Dentistry. Self-representation is fraught with danger. People unsophisticated in the law are easily overwhelmed and can make mistakes despite how convinced they are of their innocence. Additionally, some dental professionals might believe that they can save money by representing themselves. Nothing could be further from the truth. Hiring an experienced, savvy, and zealous professional licensing attorney could save your practice and therefore your livelihood.

Dentistry professionals, like other professional licensees, face a myriad of disciplinary possibilities. These possibilities range from censure and public reprimand to suspension or revocation. Dental professionals may also suffer punishments such as public reprimand, a probationary period with conditions placed on their license to practice dentistry, suspension, and finally revocation. Enlisting a vigorous dental licensing attorney to fight on your behalf will give you the best chance of receiving the least severe punishment possible under the circumstances. Those conditions also include particulars about the dentist’s career and history of the previous discipline. The severity of the penalty meted out by the Board of Dentistry will come down to whether the dentist has a history of professional discipline, the severity of the incident in question, and the dentist’s reputation within the dental community. Also, the disciplinary board could consider other relevant factors such as whether there was a victim in the case and whether he or she suffered any injuries.

Dental professionals enjoy a plethora of rights before the government, presented by the licensing board, can impose a sanction on their ability to practice.  The rights professional licensees have are similar to those afforded to a criminal defendant. Chief among those rights is the right to a fair and impartial hearing before a neutral and detached magistrate or fact finder. It is important to note that there is no right to a trial by jury. But, the licensee has the right to see the government’s evidence, cross-examine or confront witnesses, and to call witnesses to testify on their behalf. Professional licensees have a right not to incriminate themselves, but an invocation of their right not to incriminate themselves may be used as negative evidence against them.

Consult an Experienced and Dedicated Dental Licensing Attorney before Speaking to Anyone about a Complaint or Investigation into your Conduct

You have the right to counsel of your choosing to represent you, even during the investigation phase of a claim made against you. Choose Kansas and Missouri professional licensing attorney Danielle Sanger to fight for you and your livelihood. Call Attorney Sanger today at 785-979-4353 to schedule a free consultation.

To this point in 2017, the Kansas Board of Pharmacy (“the Board”) has issued six disciplinary decisions against pharmacists. One decision related to the admission as a pharmacist in Kansas and the other five were issued against practicing pharmacists. These decisions must be carefully reviewed by pharmacists who are under investigation or currently facing disciplinary action so they can analogize or distinguish the facts of their situation with theirs. Understanding the Board’s disciplinary rationale assists Kansas professional licensing attorney Danielle Sanger when informing her clients about the range of potential discipline. Additionally, reviewing disciplinary decisions can assist Attorney Sanger with learning the tenor of the Board which, in turn, will guide her to give the proper advice to her clients.

In one disciplinary decision, the respondent licensee faced allegations of failing to fill a prescription correctly. The complaint issued by the Board alleged that they received a complaint from a healthcare provider that the pharmacist in question failed to verify the quantity of narcotics dispensed. The problem stemmed from a change in the patient’s prescription for Percocet. The quantity improperly dispensed was the amount for an old prescription and not the latest order. The licensee failed to verify the proper quantity after a technician filled the order.After finding a violation, the Board fined the pharmacist $500. The Board also ordered the licensee to complete three continuing education requirements and submit a corrective action plan.

In another decision, the Board denied admission to an applicant. The applicant applied for a reciprocal transfer as a pharmacist into Kansas. On her application, the pharmacist admitted she was previously convicted of a crime as well as admitting to having a substance abuse problem. However, the applicant claimed she gave no positive urine test for illegal substances within the previous five years. The Board sought clarification of these issues before ruling on the application. The applicant failed to respond and, accordingly, the Board denied the application.

The Board disciplined another pharmacist for continued drug use. This pharmacist had previously been the subject of a Consent Order originating from a complaint alleging substance abuse wherein it was alleged that the pharmacist diverted narcotics to self-medicate without a prescription. The pharmacist was subject to additional disciplinary action after an allegation came to light of the licensee’s use of an over-the-counter drug the is listed on a prohibited list. Therefore, the licensee violated the previous Consent Order. The Board ruled that the licensee must continue to seek treatment through the Kansas Pharmacy Recovery Network for an additional five years.

In the most lenient disciplinary action in 2017 to date, the Board fined a pharmacist $5.00 per day for every day the pharmacist failed to file a registration change from pharmacist-in-charge. The total penalty was $70.00.

The Board punished another pharmacist who failed to sign a report. The pharmacist was on-duty when another pharmacist filled a prescription and transposed the dosage. The error was duly reported, and a report prepared. However, the licensee refused to sign the report. The Board fined the licensee $500.00 for refusing to sign a report that the licensee had an obligation to sign.

Finally, the Board fined a pharmacist-in-charge of a pharmacy when the pharmacist permitted a pharmacy technician to continue to work after her registration expired. The pharmacist knew of the problem and disregarded it.

Pharmacists Can Turn To Attorney Danielle Sanger For Guidance

While some of the disciplinary actions in 2017 were nominal fines, the Board possesses the authority to revoke a pharmacist’s license. Therefore, matters pending before the Board should not be taken lightly. Kansas Professional Licensing Attorney Danielle Sanger will fight to protect your rights and your livelihood if you are facing professional discipline. Call Attorney Sanger today at 785-979-4353 to schedule a consultation.