Factors to Consider When Breaking Up Your New York and New Jersey Health Care Partnership
Unlike ordinary professional partnerships, the breakup of a health care partnership - like all other aspects of the health care industry - is heavily regulated and involves complicated issues that will follow the "practitioner-partners" long after the partnership has been terminated.
Most importantly, the practitioner-partners must take calculated measures to preserve and maintain the medical charts and records of the medial practice. This vital issue can become especially complicated where the breakup is less than amicable and where the practitioner-partners are not in agreement over the division of the medical charts and records. Another critical area of concern involves post-termination audits, recoupments and investigations that the health care partnership may undergo and that the practitioner-partners will be obligated to address and answer.
If these issues, among many others, are not addressed in an existing professional partnership agreement it is necessary to draft a health care partnership termination agreement and outline in detail the practitioner-partners' obligations and responsibilities post-termination. The termination agreement, and the discussions/negotiations leading to the termination agreement, will give the practitioner-partners as clear understanding as to their rights and obligations post-termination and will relieve a great deal of unnecessary fighting or litigation in the future.
At minimum, practitioner-partners should evaluate the following issues when considering a partnership breakup:
(a) Allocation of medical office phone number;
(b) Retention of medical office location;
(c) Division of staff members;
(d) Division of medical equipment and responsibility for future payments, if any, on equipment leases and/or loans;
(e) Maintenance of medical charts and/or records and patients' post-termination access to same; and
(f) Non-disparagement of fellow practitioner-partners.
For more information concerning health care partnership breakups, dissolution, professional partnership agreements and/or health care partnership termination agreements, please contact Ms. Ilana Sable, Esq. to review and evaluate the options available to you.
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