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Protecting Peer Review Information
Audio CD/MP3
   Recorded February 7, 2008

Faculty: Susan Lapenta & Phil Zarone

Has the following scenario made the rounds at your medical staff lounge? A medical staff peer review committee conducts a thorough evaluation of a popular colleague. The committee concludes that his care is substandard and makes the difficult decision to recommend that his privileges be restricted. Months later, some of the documents prepared by the peer review committee are obtained by a malpractice attorney and are used at trial. Members of the peer review committee are aghast, feeling that they have contributed to the downfall of a colleague. Physicians resign from the committee en masse, and many members of the medical staff vow never to do peer review again.

Even if this hasn't happened at your hospital, the risk of such scenarios is what keeps many physicians from engaging in the candid discussions and evaluations that are critical for good peer review. Fortunately, there are a variety of steps hospitals can take - from the mundane to the creative - to ensure that peer review information is used for its intended purpose of improving patient care.

Topics discussed in this audio CD/MP3 include:

  • the basics of the peer review privilege – what is privileged and who is immune?
  • how do you maximize the effectiveness of your state's statutory peer review privilege?
  • what steps need to be documented during the peer review process?
  • how much detail is needed in meeting minutes and other documentation?
  • how do you avoid waiving the peer review privilege or other applicable privileges?
  • what happens when the State Board wants your peer review documents?
  • how long must peer review documentation be retained?
  • can you protect your peer review documents in antitrust, EMTALA, and civil rights cases?
  • what are the uses - and limitations - of the attorney-client privilege and attorney work-product doctrine in protecting peer review information?
  • obtaining a protective order to limit the uses of any peer review information that is disclosed
  • does the federal Patient Safety and Quality Improvement Act of 2005 offer any hope for peer reviewers?


Audio CD or MP3 only: $225

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