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Louisiana physicians get legal protection after Katrina

Emergency Management Alert, July 22, 2008

The state of Louisiana has passed landmark legislation designed to protect medical personnel from civil suits and provide a board of professionals to review criminal charges.

On June 8, Gov. Bobby Jindal signed the last bill in a three-piece package designed to protect healthcare workers, reported the Associated Press (AP). Louisiana physicians sought passage of the legislation after three healthcare professionals—a physician and two nurses—were accused of killing hospital patients in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The charges were dropped against the nurses and a grand jury refused to indict the physician, but emergency physicians feel susceptible to future incriminations for their efforts during the catastrophe, reported the AP.

Two of the new laws limit civil lawsuits against medical professionals who work during a declared disaster. The third lets prosecutors use a medical panel to review evidence when a physician or nurse is suspected of euthanasia or other criminal medical actions during a disaster, the AP reported. The measures extend the so-called Good Samaritan law, which protects people offering emergency assistances from lawsuits, to healthcare professionals who are being paid during a disaster. A provision protects medical workers when “reverse” triage protocols are put into use during disasters, whereby patients not expected to survive are the last to be evacuated.

Proponents who worked to have the measures passed hope it will catch on it other states, the AP reported.

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