Ohio Code 4730.22 – Liability of physician – duties of health care facility – individual liability
(A) When performing authorized services, a physician assistant acts as the agent of the physician assistant‘s supervising physician. The supervising physician is legally responsible and assumes legal liability for the services provided by the physician assistant.
Terms Used In Ohio Code 4730.22
- Damages: Money paid by defendants to successful plaintiffs in civil cases to compensate the plaintiffs for their injuries.
- Health care facility: means any of the following:
(1) A hospital registered with the department of health under section 3701. See Ohio Code 4730.01
- Person: includes an individual, corporation, business trust, estate, trust, partnership, and association. See Ohio Code 1.59
- Physician: means an individual who is authorized under Chapter 4731 of the Revised Code to practice medicine and surgery, osteopathic medicine and surgery, or podiatric medicine and surgery. See Ohio Code 4730.01
- Physician assistant: means an individual who is licensed under Chapter 4730 of the Revised Code to provide services as a physician assistant to patients under the supervision, control, and direction of one or more physicians. See Ohio Code 1.64
- Property: means real and personal property. See Ohio Code 1.59
- Service: means a medical activity that requires training in the diagnosis, treatment, or prevention of disease. See Ohio Code 4730.01
The physician is not responsible or liable for any services provided by the physician assistant after their supervision agreement expires or is terminated.
(B) When a health care facility permits physician assistants to practice within that facility or any other health care facility under its control, the health care facility shall make reasonable efforts to explain to each individual who may work with a particular physician assistant the scope of that physician assistant’s practice within the facility. The appropriate credentialing body within the health care facility shall provide, on request of an individual practicing in the facility with a physician assistant, a copy of the facility’s policies on the practice of physician assistants within the facility and a copy of each supervision agreement applicable to the physician assistant.
An individual who follows the orders of a physician assistant practicing in a health care facility is not subject to disciplinary action by any administrative agency that governs that individual’s conduct and is not liable in damages in a civil action for injury, death, or loss to person or property resulting from the individual’s acts or omissions in the performance of any procedure, treatment, or other health care service if the individual reasonably believed that the physician assistant was acting within the proper scope of practice or was relaying medical orders from a supervising physician, unless the act or omission constitutes willful or wanton misconduct.