Why Your Doctor Left Town In A Huff; Contracts Often Limit Where Physicians Can Work If They Change Employers

Patients may just shrug when they learn their doctor plans to move to a new office.

After all, they can just follow, right?

Maybe not. Or at least, not easily.

Physician contracts often contain restrictive covenants that limit where doctors can work if they leave their current practices. The idea is to keep them from competing with their old employer.

For example, the contract could require the doctor's new office to be 15 or more miles away. The doctor also might have to give up privileges at the local hospital.

"These contract provisions hold numerous traps for the unwary," says Dennis Hursh, an attorney who has provided legal services to physicians for more than three decades and is the author of "The Final Hurdle: A Physician's Guide to Negotiating a Fair Employment Agreement." (www.TheFinalHurdle.com)
Patients can be left scrambling to find a new physician.

The situation can be even worse for the doctor, who essentially might have to start his or her career over again, building a new patient base.

Hursh says it's not unusual for him to answer desperate phone calls from doctors who paid little attention when they agreed to their contracts, but now wonder whether their soon-to-be-former employers can enforce the restrictions.

"Unfortunately, they probably can," he says.

Doctors need to be diligent and negotiate favorable terms before they sign an employment contract, he says. Hursh says there are several ways to deal with restrictive covenants so that doctors are not facing career-damaging situations.

•  Keep the distance reasonable. Although geographic restrictions are common, in most cases the agreement should not require the doctor's new office to be more than five miles from the old one. In rural areas, a somewhat larger area may be reasonable, Hursh says.
Also, when employers have multiple offices, the distance rule should apply only to the office where the doctor spent most of his or her working time.

•  The general practice of medicine should not be restricted. "It's one thing to agree that patients will have to drive five miles from your old office if they want to continue seeing you," Hursh says. "It's another thing to agree you won't see patients in hospitals, nursing homes or ambulatory surgical centers that are within the prohibited area."

•  Continuing the doctor-patient relationship. Patients often become attached to a particular doctor and want to stick with him or her. But when a doctor moves to a new practice that can get tricky.

Contracts usually prohibit doctors from directly asking their patients to follow them to the new practice, Hursh says. Barring such solicitation, whether it's in the office or by phone call or letter, is reasonable, he says. But advertisements by the doctor's new employer should not be considered direct solicitation.

•  Sometimes restrictions should not apply. If an employer fires a doctor without cause, then the restrictive covenant should not go into effect, Hursh says. That's also true if the employer breaches its agreement with the doctor, although that can be difficult to negotiate, he says.

"An employer could worry the physician will claim some far-fetched theory of an alleged breach to get out of the restriction," he says. "One way to deal with that might be to list specific grounds for a breach in the contract."

Hursh says one of the most extreme cases he ever experienced involved a doctor whose non-compete clause prohibited the practice of medicine within 65 miles.

A hospital 62 miles away wanted to hire him.

It was while negotiating a contract with the hospital that Hursh and the hospital's attorney discovered the restriction.

"The restriction was so ludicrous that we both agreed that the former employer would almost certainly lose if they tried to sue," Hursh says.
But the hospital figured: why take chances.

The offer to hire the doctor was withdrawn.

About Dennis Hursh

Dennis Hursh has been providing health-care legal services for more than three decades. Since 1992, he has been managing partner of Hursh & Hursh, P.C., www.PaHealthLaw.com, a Pennsylvania law firm that serves the needs of physicians and medical practices. He is a member of the American Health Lawyers Association, where he is involved in the Physician Organizations Practice Group.

March 25, 2015 (Quad Cities):  The Salvation Army announces the closing of the Rock Island Salvation Army Family Store at 2125 - 11th Street, effective March 31, 2015.

The Rock Island Family Store's closure is part of the River Valley Adult Rehabilitation Center's plan called  the Diversification Project.  The Project's goal is to generate enough funding for growth in the future in order to help more people in need.  The Salvation Army provides valuable services to the adults in our community battling addictions.  It is our plan to phase out the smaller 5,000-6,000 sq. ft. stores with limited parking and replacing those stores with more modern looking 20,000 to 30,000 sq. ft. stores with a larger variety of goods to choose from, and with plenty of parking.

The first step in moving forward toward this project is closing the Rock Island Family Store. Fortunately, the staff will be reassigned to work at other Salvation Army Family Stores in the area.

Step two will be closing a small store in Clinton and replacing it with a newer and much larger Clinton 
Family Store in the summer of 2015.  The new Clinton store will be located at 2808 S. 25th Street (formerly Office Max) and will bring 60 new jobs to the area.

Step three involves purchasing a new, larger store in Cedar Rapids to replace a smaller store in that area. The  Salvation Army's goal is to open that store by late summer 2015.

The success of the plan will also require each store to be self-processing.  Captain Alex Velasquez, Adult Rehabilitation Center Administrator explains, "The Salvation Army strives to help our beneficiaries overcome addictions through work therapy/job training.  The larger stores will have the potential to generate more jobs and increase funds to provide addition rehabilitation service in our community, and surrounding areas.   The Salvation Army River Valley Adult Rehabilitation Center provides life skills and job training such as Forklift Driving/Certification, Serve Safe Certification for the restaurant industry, a GED program, and much more."

Major Gary Felton, Quad Cities Coordinator, states that "when this community generously donates their gently used items, The Salvation Army uses those items to transform lives.  The Quad Cities is very fortunate to have an Adult Rehabilitation Center in our community with services that change not just the men in the program, but their entire families' lives."

We're cooking up good things!

DAVENPORT–Shopping for a laptop? Now you can purchase gently used, refurbished laptops and flat-screen computer monitors online from Waste Commission of Scott County's Electronic Demanufacturing Facility, through its new Electronics Reuse Program.  

"We're proud of our new Reuse Program. It's another step in the right direction for the environment and for our community," said Kathy Morris, Director of the Commission.  

Reuse saves natural resources, extends the life of discarded electronics, and retains their value close to home.  

The Electronic Demanufacturing Facility launched its Reuse Program in January 2015 to comply with the R2:2013 (Responsible Recycling) standard for electronics recyclers. Rather than demanufacture and recycle electronics with additional useful life, the Facility now tests some items for key functions and refurbishes them for resale.  

To view or purchase electronics, visit the eBay store: http://stores.ebay.com/wastecomrecycling/. For safety reasons, all transactions occur online, and all purchased items are shipped to the buyer at no extra charge. No shopping or viewing of items for sale may take place at the Electronic Demanufacturing Facility.

Through the Reuse Program, the Facility continues to focus on data security as the highest priority. All data received is securely managed and destroyed. For hard drives that will be reused, technicians use state-of-the-art hardware and software to destroy all data found on the drive. The success of this process is then validated through a second, independent review. Finally, the data-destruction process is audited on a regular basis by a third party.

The Electronic Demanufacturing Facility holds R2:2013, ISO 14001:2004, and OHSAS 18001:2007 certifications and is a Microsoft Registered Refurbisher.

The Facility is located at 1048 East 59th St., Davenport. Hours are 7:30 a.m.-4 p.m. weekdays. No appointment is necessary to drop off electronics, and there is no charge for residents of Scott and Rock Island counties.

For more information, please visit http://www.wastecom.com or call (563) 381-1300.

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