As a licensed physical therapist working in the state of Montana, you have spent years meeting the profession’s rigorous educational requirements, including spending time doing clinical work. You have also studied for and passed the National Physical Therapy Examination as well as Montana’s state jurisprudence examination, and you’ve gathered and submitted the information required by the state’s Board of Physical Therapy Examiners for your license application.
As a licensed physical therapist in Montana, you know how important it is to maintain your license, including taking the required continuing education, so that you can renew your license each year. If you learn that someone has filed a misconduct complaint against you, it is just as important to take active steps to protect your rights and to defend the license you’ve worked so hard to earn. Contacting the LLF National Law Firm’s Professional License Defense Team is one of the best steps you can take to protect your license, your reputation, and your future. Call us today at 888.535.3686 or fill out our contact form. We will schedule a confidential consultation with you so that you can tell us about your case, and we can explain the ways we can help.
Montana Physical Therapist Licensing
Physical therapist licenses in Montana are issued by the state’s Board of Physical Therapy Examiners, which is a part of the Montana Department of Labor & Industry. The Board is responsible for protecting the “health, safety and well being” of people in Montana by licensing qualified physical therapists and by regulating the practice of physical therapy as a profession. This includes evaluating applicants to make sure they meet the Board’s standards; reviewing renewal applications and confirming that the PTs have met the Board’s continuing education requirements; and reviewing misconduct complaints and reports, and disciplining PTs who the Board finds have committed misconduct.
One thing that can easily stand in the way of both an initial physical therapist license and a renewal is a criminal conviction. The Board has the power to reject applicants and license renewals where the physical therapist has been convicted of a crime. Because the Board considers a number of factors when an applicant or licensee has a criminal conviction in their background, the way the conviction is disclosed to the Board can have a significant impact on how the Board evaluates the physical therapist’s situation.
The Professional License Defense Team understands the kinds of issues that licensing boards, such as Montana’s Board of Physical Therapy Examiners, consider to be important. We can help prepare a disclosure to the Board that includes a detailed explanation of the incident and the steps that the physical therapist has taken since the conviction to move past it, so that the Board can make a fair determination as to whether to issue or renew the license. This can often make the difference between the Board refusing a license and agreeing to allow it.
When it comes to misconduct complaints, the Board works with the Department of Labor & Industry to review, investigate, and process complaints and to discipline physical therapists where there are facts that support a finding that misconduct occurred. After an investigation conducted by the Department, a screening panel of Board members will review the information that has been gathered to determine whether to send the physical therapist a notice of disciplinary action or, in other cases, to dismiss the misconduct complaint.
What Montana’s Board of Physical Therapy Examiners Does When it Comes to Regulating Physical Therapists
As noted above, in addition to its important role in issuing and renewing physical therapist licenses, the Board of Physical Therapy also determines whether to discipline physical therapists who have been accused of misconduct. While the misconduct investigations are handled by the Department of Labor & Industry, it is the Board that ultimately makes the decision based on the information gathered by the department’s investigators.
Certain types of public discipline administered by the Board against a physical therapist will be published as part of the physical therapist’s online license record. This information is available to anybody who chooses to use the Department of Labor & Industry’s online License Search tool. This means that if you are disciplined by the Board and that discipline is meant to be public, it will become part of your online record.
The fact that discipline can become part of your public record is just one more reason to take it seriously if you learn that someone has filed a misconduct complaint against you, or that you are being investigated by the Department of Labor & Industry for alleged misconduct. The Professional License Defense Team is here to protect your rights from the day you learn you have been accused of misconduct, and to defend you in any disciplinary proceeding that may follow.
The Disciplinary Authority of Montana’s Board of Physical Therapy Examiners
Montana law gives the Board of Physical Therapy Examiners the right to discipline physical therapists for a number of different types of misconduct, including:
- Incompetence or negligence in the practice of physical therapy, including because of alcohol or drug consumption, abuse, or addiction
- Sexual abuse or misconduct, including engaging in sexual relations with a patient
- Failing to provide a patient with copies of their treatment records upon request
- Providing physical therapy services that the PT knows they are not competent to perform
- Failing to refer a patient to a qualified professional when circumstances require it
- Promoting an unnecessary or ineffective procedure or treatment for the PT’s own gain
- Continuing to provide treatment to the patient when treatment is no longer necessary
- Treating a patient by a “secret method” that the PT then refuses to disclose to the Board
- Failing to properly supervise staff to the point where the patient’s well-being is at risk
- Willfully violating the Board or other health agencies’ rules
- Engaging in fee-splitting in connection with patient referrals
There are certain procedures that the Board and the Department of Labor & Industry follow when someone files a complaint alleging that a physical therapist has committed misconduct. In many cases, the Department will ask the physical therapist for a written response to the complaint as part of the investigative process.
The day you learn that someone has filed a complaint against you or that you are being investigated for misconduct is the best time to contact the LLF National Law Firm’s Professional License Defense Team for help. The sooner we are aware of your case, the more help we can typically provide. We will make sure you meet any response deadlines set by the Department investigator, and can help you prepare your response to the investigator’s questions or to the complaint itself. We will use our experience to protect your rights and help preserve your license and your future.
How Montana’s Board of Physical Therapy Examiners Learns About Alleged Misconduct
Anyone can file a complaint against a physical therapist. Those complaints are received by the Department of Labor & Industry, which coordinates with the Board of Physical Therapy Examiners to investigate complaints, review information that the Department’s investigators gather in connection with those complaints, determine whether to discipline the physical therapist, and, where discipline is necessary, decide what discipline to impose.
The Department of Labor & Industry maintains a webpage where the public can learn about the complaint process, and can either file the complaint online or download a paper complaint form that can be mailed or emailed to the Department. The Board of Physical Therapy Examiners’ home page also has a link to the Department’s complaint page. In short, Montana makes it easy for anyone to file a complaint against a physical therapist.
The Board also learns of misconduct when physical therapists self-report things like criminal convictions or discipline from licensing bodies in other states to the Board. If you find yourself in a position where you have to self-report a criminal conviction or discipline from another state, the Professional License Defense Team can help you do so in a way that will maximize your chances that the Board will not take adverse action against your license, particularly action that could prevent you from practicing physical therapy.
Finally, because physical therapists are required to report misconduct by other physical therapists to the Board, the Board will sometimes learn about alleged misconduct from a therapist’s colleagues.
No matter how the Board learns of alleged misconduct against you, once you learn that you have been accused, you need to take steps to protect yourself and your license. The Professional License Defense Team understands what it takes to effectively defend you in these kinds of situations, and we will use our experience and our understanding of the laws, regulations, and rules that apply in physical therapist disciplinary cases to give you the best chance of a favorable outcome.
Investigations of Physical Therapist Misconduct Allegations in Montana
Montana’s Department of Labor & Industry is responsible for processing and investigating misconduct complaints filed against a wide range of licensed professionals in Montana, including physical therapists. There is a process that the Department typically follows when it receives a misconduct complaint. The steps of the process include:
- Initial evaluation. The Department will review the complaint to make sure it alleges the kind of misconduct that the Board of Physical Therapy Examiners has jurisdiction over. Fee disputes, for example, may fall outside of the Board’s powers to regulate the practice of physical therapy. In those cases, the person who filed the complaint will be notified that the Department will not be moving forward with the case.
- Investigation. Where the Department decides that the complaint alleges misconduct that the Board has jurisdiction over, it will gather more information. It may ask the physical therapist named in the complaint to respond to it in writing. An investigator may interview the accused physical therapist, the person who filed the complaint, and any other potential witnesses. The investigator may also gather documents from a variety of sources that may relate to the case. Investigations can take weeks or months before they are complete.
- Screening Panel review. When the investigation is complete, an attorney from the Department will take the results of the investigation to a panel – called a “Screening Panel” – that is made up of Board members. The Screening Panel will review the findings and determine whether it appears misconduct has occurred.
- Dismissal or Notice of Proposed Board Action. If the Screening Panel determines that no violation has taken place, it will dismiss the case. If it believes that the physical therapist has committed misconduct, the Department attorney will send a Notice of Proposed Board Action & Opportunity for Hearing to the physical therapist. The notice will summarize the facts against the physical therapist and the law or laws the PT is being accused of violating.
- Settlement or Hearing. The physical therapist may accept the proposed board action against them or may negotiate with the Board to resolve the matter in a different way. Most cases resolve themselves with the physical therapist either accepting the Board’s proposed action or negotiating a settlement with the Board. Cases that go to a hearing will be heard by a different panel of Board members, called the “Adjudication Panel.”
The LLF National Law Firm’s Professional License Defense Team can help you through each of these stages. During the investigation, we can prepare you for your interview and even be there with you when it happens, to make sure you only answer clear and fair questions that you understand. If the Board proposes to discipline you, we can negotiate the terms to try to resolve them as favorably as possible. And if your case goes to a hearing, we will be there to protect your rights and vigorously defend you and your license from start to finish.
The Board has a range of sanctions that it can impose on a physical therapist found to have committed misconduct, including:
- Censuring or reprimanding the physical therapist, which can be public or private
- Fining the physical therapist
- Restricting the scope of the physical therapist’s practice
- Requiring the physical therapist to be monitored by an approved supervisor
- Suspending their license for a fixed period or an indefinite period
- Revoking their license
The Board may also condition the physical therapist’s license on the therapist completing one or more educational courses or successfully completing a substance abuse program.
The LLF National Law Firm’s Professional License Defense Team Can Help Protect Your Physical Therapist License in Montana
When you learn that someone has filed a misconduct complaint against you with the Department of Labor & Industry, it can be very stressful. Depending on the allegations in the complaint, your physical therapist license could be at risk. All you have worked for, the key to your career and livelihood, may be at risk. Investigations can take months to complete, and the strain of not knowing what is going to happen can be difficult for anyone to handle.
You don’t need to do it alone. The Professional License Defense Team is here for you. Our experienced attorneys understand the law, regulations, rules, and procedures that apply in physical therapist misconduct investigations and disciplinary proceedings. We can help you understand what is happening with your case; respond to investigator requests for information; make sure you meet any deadlines that the Department or Board imposes during the process; and through it all, protect your rights and defend your license. We have helped professional license holders, including physical therapists, defend themselves against disciplinary allegations, and we can help you through this difficult time.
Call the LLF National Law Firm’s Professional License Defense Team today at 888.535.3686, or fill out our contact form, and we will schedule a confidential consultation so that you can tell us about your case, and we can explain how we can help.