Do nursing schools have to provide health insurance to students?

[hkneurorn]

Hello all,

I am in a predicament. I had an injury today at the clinical site. I have my own health insurance. The school requires that students have their own health insurance which I thought was what all schools did. The patients blood is being drawn and I'll get the results in a few days. The issue is, I went to an urgent care facility to get my baseline drawn and get treatment or whatever. Well the manager there was saying that the school is supposed to provide me with my health insurance and cover me at the facility site they are sending me out to. As in I am not supposed to have my own separate health insurance to pay for things like injuries at the clinical site. He went on saying if I go ahead and pay for it on my own then I am liable and could go to jail when they are audited and the state of California finds out that the school did not provide me health insurance and that I knew that and I payed for it anyway. In addition, he said if I choose to not get treatment and later on I do have some communicable disease from this incident and I am practicing as a nurse and the state of California finds out that I did not follow up with proper testing and treatment I could lose my license for having some disease like HIV and not telling my employer about it. I have no idea if this is true but I don't know why he would lie about it. I already signed some release of liability document to my school so I'm kind of nervous about this. I just want to know if this is true. The patient was low risk so I'm not SUPER nervous about that but this legal thing is scaring me. I of course know what the protocol is for bodily fluids exposure but I had no idea about this legal aspect of it. If someone could enlighten me I would really appreciate it. Thank you.

[akulahawkRN, ADN, RN, EMT-P]

The school I'm at encourages students to have their own health insurance. It is, however, possible that your school has an insurance policy that's basically a workman's comp. You'll have to check with your school about that. Chances are your school has a process in place to report exposures, injuries, and illnesses that are acquired while you're at one of their clinical sites. I would imagine that if you have a student handbook you'll be able to find the procedure for reporting that stuff.

As to whether or not they're required to have those policies, that's something for the legal folks to deal with. Good luck!

[Julesmama28]

We are all required to carry our own private insurance. The school requires proof before we can go to clinical.

[krisiepoo]

From what I understand, students need to have health insurance. My school I had to either buy theirs or prove I have my own. If you used your own insurance and signed the waiver from the school (which you would have done in order to not be charged) I don't understand what the problem is.

He may have been saying that this is similar to a workmens comp claim where the school should be paying for it but the jail thing sounds ridiculous to me and I don't know where that would come from.

[mrsboots87]

I am thinking the person you spoke with either had wrong info or explained things poorly. Some schools provide in school insurance. As in, for a small fee you can see the NPs at their health center when you get ill or have minor injuries. I have even heard of some nursing schools having accident insurance included in their tuition for incidents such as what happened to you. However, besides the schools that offer it as an aditional cost to you, I am not aware of them be required by law to provide a workers comp type insurance.

At my school, we are not required to purchase health insurance in any form but are strongly urged to do so. We sign a form in the beginning of each semester releasing the school as well as the clinical facilities from any liability during our learning experience. If we get a needle stick, or twisted ankle, or throw out our back, or what have you, we have to be seen and an incident report is filed, but we are responsible for paying for it or using our personal insurance. There is no law here requiring the school or facility to cover the accident. The basic rational for that is because we are not employees. We are not paid to offer our services and facilities dont have to allow us there nor do they "need" us. We are paying for our education, so it stands to reason that we need to pay for our insurance. I believe most if not all states and schools are like this, but it would be good of you to research your state law or speak to a nursing advisor at your school asap.

Lastly, it is illegal for a prospective employer to ask about your HIV/AIDS status. And if you do tell them, they "cant" discriminate against you. Now if there is an incident wear your infected blood (heaven forbid you contract anything), then you would need to disclose it so they can test the patient. But outside of that, MOST illnesses are not required to be disclosed and they cant sue you if it is found you have a disease later.

[Krzysztof]

The practice manager of an urgent care office, while very intelligent I'm sure, is not an authoritative source of information on anything other than managing an urgent care office. And even that's not necessarily so.

[Krzysztof]

The practice manager of an urgent care office, while very intelligent I'm sure, is not an authoritative source of information on anything other than managing an urgent care office. And even that's not necessarily so.

That sounded bad. I simply mean to say that legal advice may not be his forte.

[meanmaryjean, DNP, RN]

Jail?

Losing your license?

I hardly think so.

[springchick1, ADN, RN]

We are required to buy our own health insurance at my school and we can't do clinicals until we can show proof. The only type of insurance we buy from our school is Liability Insurance, which is also a requirement.

[KelRN215, BSN, RN]

This probably falls under the insurance that the school has on its program. Your health insurance is unlikely to pay the claim anyway. The urgent care will submit it and your health insurance will reject it stating that another party is liable for payment. They'll send you a letter saying that more information is needed and then they'll say the school and/or the facility are responsible for it.

The school is not required to provide you with "health insurance" though they may have an option to purchase a student insurance plan through them. Everyone is required to carry health insurance for themselves as of Jan 1 of this year. That doesn't mean that there aren't instances when someone or something other than your health insurance is liable for payment of certain claims. If you purchased health insurance through your school, the policy would likely be very minimal. You need your own health insurance for your life.

You are not obligated to report your HIV status to your employer and, as another poster said, it is illegal for them to ask. You are also not obligated to take post-exposure prophylaxis either. They have to offer it to you but whether you choose to do it is up to you. And, no you will not lose your license years in the future for something that happened while you are in school.

In short, the practice manager doesn't know what he's talking about and shouldn't be talking about legalities.

[Kuriin, BSN, RN]

We are required to have our own insurance and in the event that we do not, we can pay for school insurance. Just wanted to add that the school insurance is actually better than 95% most insurance plans out there. Lol.

Listen to KelRN. That manager was wrong on so many levels and I think he's trying his best to not get sued.

[hkneurorn]

Thank you everybody.

I ended up going to the ER to get my blood drawn for baseline. I also found out that the source patient is negative. I still have to do follow up blood work though. No prophylaxis meds based on the patients negative results. I just hope I don't get thrown in jail or fined for "fraud" like that guy said. The nurses at the ER had no idea what I was talking about when I told them what this guy told me.

I'm still worried about the possible legal issues. So as far as you all know, if a student is injured at a clinical site the student is responsible to pay for treatment with their own health insurance not the school or facility right? Especially when the school said we need to have our own health insurance? Thank you.