If finding a good doctor in the United States is hard, finding one in Maine is a feat of Herculean proportions. This is not a knock on Maine’s good physicians, but a reflection of this state’s unique demographic realities—convenience and choice are not always guaranteed here, and this truism often holds true in healthcare.
While politicians have noted Mainers’ limited access to quality medical care, the over-regulation of doctors remains an unresolved barrier to accessible healthcare. When a doctor’s license is threatened, so is their patients’ ability to continue receiving the help they need.
The LLF National Law Firm Professional License Defense Team sees our service to physicians through this lens. By resolving license-related issues for doctors, we are also solving a grave threat to their patients’ well-being. An issue that threatens a physician’s ability to practice could very well jeopardize their patients’ lives.
Whether you are accused of misconduct, miss a crucial administrative deadline, face harm because of someone else’s mistake (perhaps a bureaucrat’s), or endure other circumstances that jeopardize your license, we want to help. Medical licensure is inherently complex, but we make it simple for the physicians we represent.
Call the LLF National Law Firm Professional License Defense Team today at 888-535-3686 or contact us online to discuss your Maine medical license and how we may help you protect it.
What Problems Can Jeopardize a Medical Career in Portland and Other Areas of Maine?
The Maine Board of Licensure in Medicine (MBML) is the primary authority overseeing physicians’ licenses. It occupies several roles that may be relevant to your case, including:
- Issuing licenses to “qualified medical doctors”
- Actively monitoring physicians and other licensed medical professionals “to maintain high professional standards and conduct”
- Hearing and “impartially” investigating complaints, including those from members of the public
- Disciplining physicians and other licensed medical professionals as necessary
Certain physicians deal with the Maine Board of Osteopathic Licensure (MBOL). By and large, though the MBML is the primary institution physicians deal with when they run into:
Performance-Related Misconduct Allegations
Physicians work long hours, often in grueling professional environments. Their jobs are among the most technically rigorous that one could conjure up. Despite these constant challenges, medical professionals are held to an exacting standard that precludes:
- Endangering a patient
- Violating the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, commonly known as HIPAA
- Working while impaired
- Surgical errors and other events that the Board may consider a dereliction of one’s professional duties
- Mishandling a controlled substance
- Fraud or misrepresentation in a professional context
- Any other professional action, or instance of inaction, that meets Maine’s grounds for discipline of a medical professional
Every physician—from Portland to Biddeford, Maine Medical Center to Mid Coast Hospital—can be judged harshly for fair and unfair criticisms of their professional demeanor, performance, and fitness.
In some cases, a doctor’s on-the-job performance could even be cited as proof that they are unfit. The MBML pledges to “safeguard the health, welfare, safety, and lives of the people of Maine by ensuring that the public is served by competent, ethical, and honest practitioners.” If it feels a doctor is physically, cognitively, or otherwise unfit to practice, it may attempt to revoke that practitioner’s license immediately.
Allegation of Misconduct Outside the Scope of Their Medical Duties
From a licensing standpoint, there is little differentiation between physicians’ private and professional lives. While they are scrutinized more constantly and intensely while working, they may be disciplined professionally if:
- They are convicted of any criminal offense that could result in incarceration for a year or more
- Off-the-job impairment begins to interfere with their work performance
- They are accused of any other off-the-job conduct that interferes with their fitness as a physician, casts doubt upon their ethics, reflects poorly on the profession, or is considered “unprofessional”
Physicians are held to a higher behavioral standard than most other professionals, and that scrutiny does not cease simply because they are off duty.
For physicians struggling with substance misuse that has yet to come to the Board’s attention, they must take advantage. These physicians may be able to enroll in Maine’s Medical Professionals Health Program (MPHP) as an alternative to discipline. Timing is always of the essence in such cases, as substance misuse is inherently unpredictable—now is the time to reach out to our Professional License Defense Team for help.
Missed Deadlines and Other Administrative Issues
Medical students sometimes mistakenly think they will merely be practicing medicine when they enter the real world of healthcare. The truth is that physicians have to be just as much administrators as they are doctors due to:
- Continuing medical education requirements (completing the required 40 hours of Category 1 CME per licensure cycle may feel like unpaid overtime)
- License renewal deadlines
- Renewal requirements, including the payment of fees and proof of compliance with all renewal conditions
- Other administrative obligations that one’s Maine medical licensing may be contingent upon
A single missed deadline, a lapse in one’s CME efforts, or other administrative oversight can find a physician unable to work.
With virtually every link in the healthcare chain pulled to the brink, physicians may find little help in keeping up with these obligations. When such an issue places your license at risk, you can find the help you need from our Professional License Defense Team.
Problems That Arise from Others’ Mistakes (Including Many Bureaucratic Issues)
As if all the obligations within a physician’s control were not daunting enough, doctors can be adversely affected by circumstances beyond their control.
From technical glitches in the online systems that govern license renewal to delays in reporting a physician’s completion of CME to false administrative flags, flawed bureaucratic and administrative systems sometimes work against physicians.
The Importance of Any Physician With Any Professional Problem Seeking Assistance Right Away
Now that we have discussed the many issues that can threaten a physician’s license and career, let’s discuss resolving them—and the importance of seeking a resolution with the utmost urgency and earnestness.
A physician accused of sexual misconduct probably understands the need to defend themselves right away—their reputation, and possibly more, is at stake. We believe that a physician dealing with an administrative issue, such as a failure to renew their license properly, should take it just as seriously.
Any issue that could disrupt your career is urgent. Our Professional License Defense Team is ready to fight for you, which may mean protecting you from:
- The revocation of your license
- The suspension of your license
- Restriction of privileges
- Fines
- Prolonged disruption of your ability to serve your patience (and do the job you have worked so hard for)
- Massive reputational harm in an industry where one’s reputation could not be more important
- Any other harmful consequences that adversely affect you, your loved ones, and your patients
License issues are often the centerpoint in a web of interconnected points. The status of your license may directly connect to your insurance coverage, current employment, and future professional opportunities. By resolving a license issue, we may also resolve several existing and potential issues—problems that you simply don’t need.
How Maine Authorities May Resolve Your License-Related Problem
In the same statute that details the grounds for discipline, the MBML explains how the Board of Licensure in Medicine may decide whether discipline is warranted. When the Board suspects a possible violation or receives a complaint alleging misconduct, it then:
- Notifies the physician or other medical professional named in the complaint “as soon as possible”
- Grants the physician 30 days to respond to the complaint
- Shares the physician’s response with the complainant (which could clarify matters and potentially lead to the dismissal of the complaint)
- If the complaint is not dismissed, the Board or a “subcommittee of the board” may conduct an “informal conference” with the physician named in the complaint (at which the physician can be accompanied by counsel)
- The physician should have a “reasonable opportunity to speak,” and presumably defend themselves from the complaint or accept fault and request a merciful decision, during the conference
- If the Board finds sufficient grounds to move further with the disciplinary process, it may negotiate a consent agreement with the physician—which could result in probation, the voluntary surrender of one’s medical license (often with conditions for reinstatement), or another agreed-upon outcome
- If the Board and physician do not reach a consent agreement, the Board may conduct an “adjudicatory hearing” and ultimately rule on the case
The Maine professional license defense we provide will be informed by this process, or any other procedures required by the MBML and your case.
Maine’s Administrative Procedures entitled any person “aggrieved by final agency action,” which can include physicians who suffer harmful discipline, to “judicial review thereof in the Superior Court.” Having effective counsel on your side may prove immensely valuable throughout the adjudication process. Our Professional License Defense Team’s value may be even more apparent should you need to appeal for judicial review.
We know that you may not be facing a misconduct allegation, and that these processes may not necessarily apply to your case. Take stock in knowing that our Professional License Defense Team knows the procedures for resolving administrative issues, bureaucratic hold-ups, and the other problems we have discussed here.
Why Our Professional License Defense Team Is Worthy of Your Trust
It does not matter whether you call Lewiston, Portland (or South Portland), Auburn, Saco, Westbrook, or another Maine community your professional home. The reach of the MBML—whether it is imposing discipline, responding to a physician’s administrative slip-up, or disrupting a physician’s career through mistakes on its own end—extends throughout Maine.
No physician’s employer can protect them. In fact, employers such as Northern Light Mercy Hospital, MaineHealth, Maine Medical Center, Biddeford, and Central Maine Medical Center sometimes work against a licensee.
What you need and deserve is a trained, experienced, effective team of advocates whose sole concern is your best interests. Our Professional License Defense Team meets this critical criterion, and physicians nationwide put their careers in our hands because:
- We have real-world experience dealing with the MBML, whether it is helping physicians negotiate consent agreements, preparing physicians to defend themselves during informal conferences and hearings, or leading the judicial review process
- Our extensive knowledge of Maine law saves critical time and eliminates the potential for confusion during a time when efficiency and clarity are at a premium
- Our considerable resources ensure that every strategic option is available to the physicians we represent, who understand the importance of fighting for their careers and reputations
- Honesty and authenticity come standard at our firm, as physicians do not need false promises, pipe dreams, or gaslighting when they are facing potentially life-changing professional developments
- Physicians know how the most high-stakes circumstances call for teamwork, and how choosing a capable, level-headed partner to overcome high-stress, high-stakes circumstances can lead to the desired result
We don’t use templates when determining how to address a given license issue. When constructing a strategy, we start with the physician and their unique problem, then work from there. Our approach to your case will be 100% personalized.
Services We Provide Physicians in Portland, Lewiston, and Other Communities Throughout the State
Once we learn about the exact license issue you want to resolve, we can better explain how we will help. For now, know that our Professional License Defense Team is capable of:
- Providing a one-of-a-kind roadmap for resolving your case, incorporating your feedback, goals, and concerns in that plan
- Prepping you for any interviews, informal meetings, formal hearings, and other high-stakes processes
- Taking a critical role in the negotiation of a consent agreement, should that be the right resolution path for your problem
- Leading any necessary appeals process
Our tangible services are important and the primary reason most physicians engage us. However, you will find that our pertinent knowledge, constant support, willingness to address your questions and concerns, resilience, and desire to secure the best outcome for you are just as memorable.
Facing a license-related problem in the Portland, Maine area? Call the LLF National Law Firm Professional License Defense Team today at 888-535-3686 or contact us online.