For those wanting to practice independently, how do you justify the risk?

[Jilly99]

if you don't want a supervising physician, how do you justify the malpractice risk, considering physicians have 7+ years of post university training whereas an NP has 2-3 years. The AMA says that the clinical experience one gets doing an NP is less than that in the first year of residency. if physicians can get destroyed in lawsuits, why wouldn't an NP be much worse off?

[Neuro Guy NP, DNP, PhD, APRN]

Well first I would be interested in knowing what your nursing background is to better be able to answer the question (that I know what details etc I can skip given your current knowledge level as it seems you are new to AN). Having said that, in reality I feel like primary care is really probably the only arena where an NP would be truly independent, you know whether it's adult/internal med, women's health, peds, etc. In your specialties (cardio, neuro, etc) even in independent states you'll need a collaborator just because that's the reality of the situation.

You'll notice all the sides comparing outcomes for independent NP care vs physician are about primary care. That's because we still do confer with physicians at the specialty level even if we're super competent in our specialty for the simple fact that we don't have the extensive residencies. I'm doing a fellowship, but still not the same as physician. And all if that is ok. For liability purposes, we have insurance. No issues there. You won't have issues with lawsuits over being an NP as long as you've practiced in line with your training which does take in account your work experience and a long as the care provided was within medically accepted standards.

[Neuro Guy NP, DNP, PhD, APRN]

*studies not sides( I hate auto correct on phones!)

[RiskManager]

Speaking as someone who does the malpractice claims, I do not see a disproportionate number of malpractice claims for NPs (or PAs) compared to physicians in the same specialty. Most non-physician providers work in primary care, which is lower on the malpractice risk spectrum than OB or the surgical specialties. For any non-physician provider, the single most important thing you can do to lower your malpractice risk is to have a high index of suspicion to refer out patients appropriately.