As a psychiatrist living and working in the Greater Cleveland area, you know better than anyone how much of your life has been devoted to getting you to where you are now. You’ve spent decades in school, years working in your field, and many hours studying for the various exams necessary for you to be able to secure your medical license and your certification as a psychiatrist. Your license and your certification are the key to your livelihood, your career, and your future.
If you are notified that someone has filed a misconduct complaint against you with the State Medical Board of Ohio, you need to take action to protect your rights and defend your license. Doing nothing is not an option, because the process will move forward whether you participate or not. And defending yourself effectively can be extremely challenging. That is why you need to contact the LLF National Law Firm’s Professional License Defense Team. Our experienced attorneys understand the disciplinary process for medical professionals in Ohio, from the investigation on. We know what it takes to defend our clients in these situations. Call us at 888.535.3686, or fill out our contact form. We’ll schedule a confidential consultation to discuss your case and explain how we can help.
Psychiatrists in the Greater Cleveland Area
There are hundreds of psychiatrists working in the Greater Cleveland Area, which includes Cleveland, Akron, Canton, and a number of smaller cities and towns from the Lake Erie shore on south. No matter where you are – Cleveland Heights, Lakewood, Cuyahoga Falls, Lorain, or any other city or town in the area, we are able to help. And as you know, if you are working as a psychiatrist, the profession pays very well – according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the annual mean wage for a psychiatrist working in Ohio was over $250,000 in 2024. That’s more than four times the average annual mean wage for all occupations in the state. And it is a strong incentive to do everything you can to protect your license.
Whether you work on your own, as part of a practice, or in a hospital or institutional setting, your medical license and psychiatry certification are absolutely the most important credentials you hold. Lose those, and you lose your career and your livelihood – not to mention your reputation. This is why it is vital to pay close attention to any notice you receive from either the State Medical Board of Ohio or the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology that a misconduct complaint has been filed against you, or that you are being investigated for misconduct.
When your future is on the line, it makes sense to take early steps to protect it. One of the first things you should do after you learn that you have been accused of misconduct or are being investigated for possible misconduct is to contact the LLF National Law Firm’s Professional License Defense Team. The sooner we begin working with you to protect your license, the more help we can provide. We can do the most to help when we are involved at the very early stages of your case – ideally before any investigation has occurred. Our experienced attorneys know how to protect your rights, while still meeting your obligations to cooperate with the Board’s investigation.
Disciplinary Actions Against Psychiatrists in the Greater Cleveland Area
The State Medical Board of Ohio is responsible for enforcing Ohio’s laws and regulations that apply to the medical profession, which, of course, includes psychiatrists and a number of other specialists. There are a number of different grounds that the Board can use as the basis for disciplining psychiatrists in the Greater Cleveland Area. These include:
- Practicing psychiatry while under the influence of drugs or alcohol
- Various forms of sexual misconduct, ranging from improper relationships with patients to sexual assault against patients or co-workers
- Improperly dispensing or prescribing drugs
- Conviction of a crime, especially if it relates to their psychiatric practice
- Improperly disclosing patient confidential information
- Not meeting the Board’s requirements for continuing education, particularly if the psychiatrist misrepresents the status of their continuing education credits when renewing their license
- Not following the state’s standards of care for patients
- Being disciplined by the medical board of another state
- If the Board has placed limits on the psychiatrist’s practice (typically as a result of a previous misconduct allegation) failing to practice within those limits
- Committing fraud or misrepresentation in a number of ways, including in connection with securing or renewing their license; advertising their practice; or in other areas related to their practice
Note that complaints against psychiatrists can be for these or any number of other types of alleged misconduct. But the Board only has jurisdiction from the state of Ohio to investigate and discipline psychiatrists for certain types of misconduct. Thus, for example, if a patient has a billing dispute with a psychiatrist, that may not result in an investigation by the Board – unless the claim is that the psychiatrist defrauded the patient in some way. Similarly, if the psychiatrist is accused of speaking rudely to the patient, the Board may not investigate the matter, since rudeness is not a prohibited act.
Sometimes the Board will investigate a complaint and, at the close of the investigation, decide not to move forward with disciplinary proceedings against the accused psychiatrist. This is because there is enough information from the investigation to show the Board that it was unlikely that the psychiatrist committed misconduct. When you work with one of the experienced attorneys from the LLF National Law Firm’s Professional License Defense Team, it increases the chances that an outcome like this may happen.
That is because we can both protect your rights during an investigation and conduct our own investigation into the facts of the situation. In some cases, we are able to uncover helpful information that the Board’s investigator either missed or disregarded. By bringing that information to the attention of the investigator and the Board, we can sometimes show the Board that the facts do not support moving forward with the disciplinary proceedings.
Not every investigation ends that way, of course. In many cases, the Board will decide to move forward with disciplinary proceedings after the investigation is complete. What is important in these cases is that you know your rights have been protected from the beginning, and that the LLF National Law Firm’s Professional License Defense Team is on your side ready to defend you during the disciplinary process. Our continuing focus is on protecting your rights and your license.
Help During Disciplinary Investigations
As a psychiatrist, you are used to interacting with people a certain way as part of your day-to-day practice. You might think those skills would help you in a Board investigator interview – but you’d be wrong. The disciplinary investigation interview is very different from anything you have probably experienced. The investigator wants to get as much information out of you as possible about the matter that is in dispute.
What is vitally important in these cases is that you understand how the process works, and the role you play in providing clear responses to questions you understand. This is a skill that can be practiced, and when you work with us, we can help you with that. When you’re being interviewed, you need to first make sure that you understand the question you’re being asked. If you don’t, you should clarify it before you answer it. Then you should focus on answering that specific question.
We can also be there with you when you’re interviewed by the Board’s investigator. If a question is not clear to us or unfair, we can ask the investigator to revise or correct the question. If your answer is not clear, or if it appears the investigator hasn’t understood what you meant, we can ask that you explain further. Most of all, we can protect your rights throughout the interview process.
When it comes to other parts of the investigation, we can also help. We’ll review and gather documents responsive to any requests the Board might make. We will make sure you meet the Board’s deadlines for responding to various parts of the investigation, and you can ask for extensions when necessary. And we can be your point of contact with the Board, so that you don’t have to worry about communicating directly with them at all times.
After the Investigation
The Board will receive a report from its investigator outlining the facts that the investigator has uncovered about the allegations made against you. Based on that, the Board will decide whether to drop the matter or to bring formal charges against you.
If the Board brings formal charges, most cases will be resolved by way of a consent agreement. These can be negotiated, and your best chance of a successful negotiation is to have someone on your side who has negotiated consent agreements before. This is what we do.
The LLF National Law Firm’s Professional License Defense Team regularly helps our clients, who include psychiatrists and other medical professionals, negotiate acceptable resolutions to disciplinary charges. We know the concerns that the Board has about these kinds of cases in Ohio, and how to address those concerns in ways that benefit our clients. Our goal is always to do everything we can to protect your license and your ability to practice psychiatry in the Greater Cleveland Area.
The Formal Hearing
Cases that are not resolved with a settlement will move forward. The Board will issue a citation against the Psychiatrist. At this point, you can ask the Board for a formal hearing, or elect to proceed on paper without a formal hearing. We can help you make this decision, which will, of course, differ from one case to another.
Where the matter moves forward without a formal hearing, a set of proposed findings of fact and a proposed order will be prepared for the Board to review. The Board can decide to accept the proposal, or to make changes to it and issue the changed version against the psychiatrist. If you have requested a formal hearing, that will be scheduled, and both sides will be able to present witnesses and evidence, and to cross-examine the other side’s witnesses and argue against the introduction of the other side’s evidence where appropriate. The Hearing Examiner will prepare a report and recommendation after the hearing has ended for the Board to review. The Board can then accept or amend the recommendation.
Potential Outcomes
In addition to dismissing the disciplinary action – obviously the most favorable result – the Board can take the following actions against the psychiatrist:
- Issue a formal reprimand
- Place the psychiatrist on probation for a period of time
- Suspend the psychiatrist’s license for a period of time or, in some cases, indefinitely until certain conditions set by the Board (such as continuing education) have been met
- Permanently revoke the psychiatrist’s license
- Fine the psychiatrist, from $1000 to $20,000, depending on the case
Again, our overarching goal as your attorneys in a disciplinary case is to protect your license so that you can continue to practice psychiatry.
The LLF National Law Firm Can Defend Your Medical License in the Greater Cleveland Area
No matter where you are practicing psychiatry in the Greater Cleveland Area – whether it’s in Cleveland itself, the larger nearby cities of Akron or Canton, or one of the other cities or towns in the area such as Parma, Berea, Tallmadge, Green, or anywhere else, the LLF National Law Firm’s Professional License Defense Team is able to help you. Our attorneys have a comprehensive understanding of the law, regulations, rules, and procedures that apply to disciplinary investigations and proceedings brought against psychiatrists by the State Medical Board of Ohio.
We can also help with the less-frequent disciplinary cases that can be brought by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology, which can affect your board certification. Here, too, you should contact us as soon as you learn that a disciplinary matter has been brought against you.
The sooner you contact us after learning that a disciplinary investigation or proceeding is underway against you, the better we will be able to defend you and your license. Call the LLF National Law Firm’s Professional License Defense Team today at 888.535.3686, or by filling out our online contact form. When you do, we will schedule a confidential consultation where you can tell us about your case, and we can answer your questions and explain how we can help.