Risk Management and Partner Society Discounts
September 14, 2023
Dear OMIC Insureds:
As we announced last year, in January of 2023, we made a few changes to the way we administer the risk management and partner society discounts. If you haven’t already earned your discounts, I wanted to remind you of the key facts to remember so that you can receive the maximum discount of 10% when your policy renews.
5% partner society discount
To receive this discount, you must attest that you are a current member of one of our 55 ophthalmology partner societies by logging into your account via MyOMIC (https://www.omic.com/UserAccounts/login) and indicating the societies to which you belong. Only one 5% discount will be applied, regardless of the number of your society memberships. The discount is applied on your renewal invoice. Follow this link to see a list of our partner societies: https://www.omic.com/partners/.
5% risk management discount
You can earn this discount by attending a live risk management presentation at one of our partner society meetings or at the AAO Annual Meeting. Click on this link to see a calendar of events: https://www.omic.com/risk-management/. Alternately, you can complete an online risk management course by contacting Risk Management Coordinator Linda Nakamura at lnakamura@omic.com or 1-800-562-6642 x652.
We request that you complete a course, whether live or online, 75 or more days prior to your renewal date. Your renewal date can be found on your policy documents or by logging into MyOMIC.com. If you have questions about your renewal date, please contact your Underwriting representative: https://www.omic.com/policyholder-services/contact-my-rep/underwriting/.
We will record a completion of one course and apply one discount per policy period. If you complete a course less than 75 days before your renewal date, that discount will be applied to your next policy term. Due to the volume of course completions, please allow approximately 7 days for your completion to be recorded in our database.
I hope these reminders are helpful to you, and please do not hesitate to contact us with any questions. For questions regarding your policy or how to access your account via MyOMIC please contact your Underwriting representative: https://www.omic.com/policyholder-services/contact-my-rep/underwriting/. For questions regarding online courses, please contact Linda Nakamura at lnakamura@omic.com or 1-800-562-6642 x652.
Thank you for being a member of OMIC!
Sincerely,
Linda Harrison, PhD
Vice President, Risk Management
Comanagement of Surgical Patients – Risk Management Strategies to Ensure Patient Safety and Mitigate Liability
August 8, 2022
Dear OMIC Insureds:
Managing expectations of patients and ensuring effective communication between care providers is especially important when ophthalmologists share care of ophthalmic surgery patients with community optometrists or optometrists within their practice.
OMIC offers risk management strategies to ensure patient safety, and avoid liability risks associated with surgical comanagement, whether it takes place within a practice or outside of it. These recommendations are based upon OMIC claims experience.
Click on this link:
OMIC Risk Management Recommendations for Comanagement of Surgical Patients
If you have questions, contact us for confidential risk management advice at riskmanagement@omic.com. Or call us at 1-800-562-6642, enter 4 for Risk Management.
Sincerely,
Hans K. Bruhn, MHS
OMIC Risk Manager
Noncompliance: what are the liability risks?
September 5, 2023
Dear OMIC Insureds:
Insureds face liability risks when patients fail to keep appointments, elect to not undergo testing, or decline treatment due to costs or personal reasons. Insureds report an increase in patients who are unable to pay their medical bills due to high deductibles, but require ongoing treatment. Take proper steps to protect the patient, yourself, and the practice.
To read more about this topic, refer to our recommendations on:
Noncompliance Guidelines
The High Cost of Refused Care – OMIC
Terminating Care for Financial Reasons
If you have questions about this topic or would like to have a confidential risk management consultation, please email riskmanagement@omic.com or call the Risk Management Hotline at 1-800-562-6642 and enter 4 for Risk Management.
Sincerely,
Michelle Pineda
OMIC Risk Manager
Preventing Wrong Events
July 10, 2023
Dear OMIC Insureds:
Whether you call them wrong events or never events, one thing is universal: you never want them to happen to you. In ophthalmology, WSPEs (wrong-site, wrong-procedure, wrong-patient errors) can lead to severe reactions to medications, additional surgery, decreased vision, and even blindness. Furthermore, WSPEs almost always lead to claims and require settlements to resolve.
We often read that wrong events are avoidable. If that’s true, why are they still happening? How do we get closer to achieving a zero-error environment?
Analysis of errors and near misses reveal how systems and protocols failed and allowed the event to happen; it also reveals how organizational culture may have contributed. Use the findings of such analyses to improve safety protocols. For example, implantation of the wrong lens occurs more frequently than it should, and is often the result of a last-minute change to the OR schedule. In the office, we continue to see errors with patient identification, leading to wrong-patient, wrong-procedure errors.
Assess whether the values and behaviors of the current culture comport with your desired goals and standards. A culture that values continuous learning and improvement, and honest communication, is more likely to result in staff who feel empowered to report an error, a near miss, or a potential weakness in the system.
As Reason’s Swiss cheese model[1] explains, no one safety protocol will prevent an error. Therefore, periodically reviewing and improving your patient safety protocols will help decrease the likelihood of error.
OMIC has resources on preventing WSPEs on our website:
https://www.omic.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/Ophthalmic-Surgery-Checklist.pdf
https://www.omic.com/wrong-sitewrong-iol-aao/
https://www.omic.com/time-out-before-intravitreal-injections-2/
https://www.omic.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Digest-Vol-31-No-1-2021-.pdf
If you have questions about this topic, contact our Risk Management Hotline for confidential consultation: riskmanagement@omic.com or 800-562-6642 and enter 4.
Sincerely,
Linda D. Harrison, PhD
Vice President, Risk Management
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[1] Reason J. Human error. New York: Cambridge University Press; 1990.
CONFIDENTIALITY NOTICE: This correspondence is intended only for the person or entity to which it is addressed and may contain information that is privileged, confidential or otherwise protected from disclosure. Dissemination, distribution or copying of this e-mail or the information herein by anyone other than the intended recipient, or an employee or agent responsible for delivering the message to the intended recipient, is prohibited. If you have received this e-mail in error, please notify us at riskmanagement@omic.com and destroy the original message and all copies.
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Use of Biosimilars
June 14, 2023
Dear Colleagues:
Recently OMIC Risk Management has received a number of inquiries regarding the use of biosimilar medications for ophthalmic care. We would like to clarify our position on this topic.
1. Bevacizumab (Avastin®) biosimilars
There is limited intraocular experience with bevacizumab biosimilars because studies leading to their FDA approval were for systemic usage for the treatment of cancer.
For this reason, the AAO and CMS issued statements that bevacizumab biosimilars should not be used in the eye; OMIC is aligned with these statements.
AAO statement 2022 https://www.aao.org/education/clinical-statement/use-of-biosimilars-in-ophthalmic-practice
2. Ranibizumab (Lucentis®) biosimilars
There is much more experience with ranibizumab biosimilars because the FDA tested them specifically for retinal diseases such as age-related macular degeneration, diabetic macular edema, and vascular occlusions. The FDA has approved ranibizumab biosimilar drugs for most of those indications, and has designated one compound as interchangeable with Lucentis®. There are health insurance carriers that have step policies in place that require ophthalmologists to use a ranibizumab biosimilar before using the brand name drug.
OMIC concurs with the AAO’s position that these drugs can be used, and the provider should be aware that the experience with these compounds is not as extensive as the brand name drug.
3. Biosimilars for treatment of Retinopathy of Prematurity (ROP)
a. Bevacizumab (Avastin®) biosimilars
OMIC’s position is that they should not be used to treat ROP at this time.
b. Ranibizumab (Lucentis®) biosimilars: These are FDA-approved drugs for the treatment of multiple retinal diseases. The experience with these compounds for the off-label treatment for ROP is limited, with recent small series studies showing potential efficacy.
OMIC’s position is that they should not be used to treat ROP at this time until further trial results become available.
If you have questions regarding this information, please contact us. Remember that you may contact the Risk Management Hotline for confidential assistance at riskmanagement@omic.com or call the Risk Management Hotline at 1-800-562-6642 and choose option 4.
Sincerely,
Michael C. Tigani, MD
Chair, OMIC Risk Management Committee
