Changing agencies and taking my patient with me.

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I work Pediatric Home Health and have worked with one patient for 2 years. I have wanted to change agencies due to lack of benefits and pay that isn't comparable to some of the other home health agencies in my area. I have not because I don't want to leave my patient. I just found out that my patient's family has wanted to change agencies, for their own reasons, but have not because they did not want to lose me. Is it possible that we change agencies together? I don't want to burn any bridges with my current agency, even though I don't feel that I can continue to work for them. I also don't want to appear malicious or sneaky, or seem like this will be something I will do with the next agency I work with.

Any input, advice, or suggestions will be appreciated!

Thanks in advance!

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Specializes in Healthcare risk management and liability.

Does your contract or employment agreement with your current agency address the issue of soliciting patients or has any sort of non-compete agreement? A whole lot of employers are sensitive to this; they consider the patients to be customers of the business, not the individual provider, and they can get snippy about departing providers poaching the patients to follow them to the new business or practice. In some cases (usually limited to physicians/non-physician providers in my experience) they will sue to enforce the soliciting/non-compete clauses in the contract.

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I am actually not sure about that but I am thankful that you brought this to my attention. I will check into it immediately. Thank you so much!

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Specializes in Complex pedi to LTC/SA & now a manager.

Check your time sheet there is often a statement that you agree to not work directly (they pay you) or indirectly (you bring them to a new agency) for xx days after you leave your current job. It's often considered an ethics violation.

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Many agencies will have you sign a non-compete statement upon hire. It has been said that these are not possible to enforce, that would be a legal question in the area where you reside. But even if there is no explicit sanction against this, as a minimum, it is considered a breach of ethics. I have heard the names of nurses discussed in non-complimentary terms because they "took" a patient, or even just "followed" a patient to another agency. (What is intriguing, is that the same agency management personnel who denigrate nurses who do this, are quite happy to receive a new patient that brings all of their nurses from a competitor).

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