Did you know that most American doctors face at least one medical malpractice lawsuit in their career? Malpractice insurance can protect you from these lawsuits.
Malpractice insurance is a type of insurance you purchase to protect your practice or staff from liability for practicing medicine. Medical malpractice insurance is vital and in the best of your interest, both professionally and financially.
Since insurance is a complex subject, understanding its structure, vocabulary, and claim prices can be complicated for you. What’s more complicated is finding the best policy for you.
Let’s talk about medical malpractice insurance, its types, which one is best for you, and how eQuoteMD can help you with malpractice insurance.
Medical Malpractice Insurance
Medical malpractice insurance provides physicians coverage for liability (financial risks) arising from the disputed services resulting in the patient’s injury or death. It covers many expenses associated with settling a malpractice suit or defending it.
Your malpractice insurance can take several forms depending on your location and the nature of your medical practice. These may include:
- Policy purchased from a private insurer (traditional insurer)
- Policy purchased through a medical risk retention group
- Coverage provided as part of policy held by your institution or employer
Types of Medical Malpractice Insurance
The following are two basic types of medical malpractice insurance:
- Occurrence-made policy – This insurance policy offers long-term (sometimes lifetime) coverage. This policy covers any claim for an incident that took place during the period of coverage – even if the claim is filed after the policy lapses. For example, if an incident happened in December 2020 and you received a claim in January 2021 after your policy expired, you would still be covered.
No tail coverage (also known as extended reporting endorsement or ERP) is purchased in the policy type – which rarely needs to be purchased. The insurance rates for this policy are higher compared to others.
- Claim-made policy – This insurance policy is cheaper, and its coverage is based on the time of the event and time of claim. If either of these occurs when the policy is not insuring, your policy will not affect. This means if a claim is made after the expiry of the policy, you would not be covered. However, you can purchase “tail coverage” or Extended Reporting Endorsement (ERP) – liability coverage that extends beyond the previous claim-made policy.
Which Policy Is Best for Physicians?
Before choosing a policy, it’s important to understand the finer details of the coverage a policy offers. Since you may have to face risks associated with cyber liability and regulatory requirements, like compliance with the HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act), you want to consider a policy that offers these types of exposure so that there remains no need to purchase separate cyber liability insurance. Also, consider your income level, affordability of the plans, and personal assets you’ll need to protect. It’s also important to know if the policy offers some form of the free tail once specific criteria are met and what form of defense costs the policy contains.
You can consult with a medical malpractice insurance broker like eQuoteMD to help you find and select the policy of your need. Insurance brokers not only find insurance for you but also give you information about the plan and help you select the best one.
eQuoteMD for Medical Malpractice Insurance
No matter your specialty or state, if you’re looking for medical malpractice insurance, we at eQuoteMD are ready to connect you with the best malpractice insurer. We will help you select the best plan at the absolute lowest price. We work on behalf of all medical specialties in all the states.
For more information about malpractice insurance, call us today at (855) 823-5283 or click here to get a quote now.
