Does your website comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA)? Do you know what that means, and what it does take to comply with the ADA? Is it applicable to your small practice website? The answer to these questions and much more is in this video.

Places of Public Accommodation

Your website for your practice does need to be ADA compliant. In fact, the ADA was first put into law in 1990, which was well before the advent of the Internet. Over the years, it’s been updated and improved for the emerging world we have now, including websites. Recently, the Supreme Court interpreted websites as places of public accommodation under the ADA, which means you need to have it available for people who are visually impaired, sometimes physically impaired, but allow people who have other needs to be able to navigate your website.  So, how does that work? How can you do something  about your website? And why does it even matter beyond being a good person? 

Fines...

You’ve started your business and you have some money, and now it is time to take it out and pay yourself. There are some right ways to do it and some wrong ways to do it. This blog will talk about 4 ways to help make sure you do it the right way.  

Getting Paid

No matter how much passion you have for helping others, at some point, you need to get paid for your services. Some people have a tough time pricing themselves appropriately. They undervalue themselves, especially early on in the business. But nevertheless, eventually, you will start to make money and be able to take some home and pay yourself. 

We actually help a lot of people with that at Origins Incubator. Our mentorship program is fairly comprehensive. We cover a lot of the mindset stuff too, and not only do we help people create their offering for patients what they are going to deliver, but we also help them write that out, so that they feel confident in saying the price out loud because they...

You are ready to start up a business.  What comes first-- the limited liability company (LLC) or the trademark?  I get this question quite a bit, so we’ll answer that in this blog and video.  We’ll also be talking about the differences between the two and how you can secure the name of your business without getting into hot water legally: What is the benefit of trademarking? Should you even do it? Is it necessary? We’ll talk about that as well.  Also, we’ll discuss what it means to register a trademark and why sometimes you might not want to do it. 

Limited Liability Company (LLC)

LLC, for those who don’t know, is a limited liability company. It is one of many types of entities that you could create. It is the most popular these days because it does provide you with limited liability while usually offering pass-through taxation for the business owner as well.  (See my other video on this channel about S-Corp taxation...

When you are building online courses, you come to the eventual question: “Do I need a separate Limited Liability Company (LLC) for my online courses?” PDF tools and other softwares can guide you in creating your online courses; however, the legalities of an LLC can be tricky. I get this question surrounding online courses all the time inside our Functional Lawyer membership.  (I am pulling this one directly from there, and if you also want to directly share and ask your own questions with me, then go check it out at FuntionalLawyer.com/Membership.)

Why Build Online Courses?

There are many good reasons to build online courses or info-products for patients or for people all over the world.  Perhaps you are tired of telling people the same thing over and over again, or you might want to just leverage your time by creating an online course. Maybe you want to help people that you can’t otherwise see because you are unavailable for one reason or...

Inconceivable! You keep using the word ‘S-Corp,'  but I do not think that word means what you think it means. Fans of The Princess Bride will recognize the reference, but in this video, I’ll talk about S-Corps (S-Corporations): why you might be using that term incorrectly, what they are, and how they can help you save money. I’m Scott Rattigan, founder of Functional Lawyer. You’ll find us at OriginsIncubator.com as well. We help functional medicine doctors establish their business and legal foundations, solid and secure, so that they can focus on helping their patients in their states. 

Sometimes when I have a legal-health assessment with a provider (some of you who don’t know me can set up a consultation with me at FunctionalLawyer.com), one of the questions in the questionnaire is, “What kind of entity do you have if you have one?”  Often, I hear people say that they have a S-Corp. When I ask them, “Okay, well, does...

A California man was charged last month with five felony counts, including falsely claiming to be a licensed doctor and practicing medicine on thousands of individuals, offering treatment for serious medical conditions, including cancer.

The Los Angeles County District Attorney announced that 44 year old Stephan Gevorkian, who lives in Studio City, faces five felony counts of practicing medicine without a certification in case BA514156.

“Practicing medicine without a license is not only a criminal activity in California, it can cause irreparable harm to the health of unsuspecting people, some with serious illnesses, who believe they are under the care of a licensed physician,” Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascón said in a statement about the case.

According to the DA’s office, an undercover investigator went to Pathways Medical and posed as a patient, sitting down with Gevorkian--owner and operator of the...

In order to avoid lapses in care for patients, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) announced an extension of the temporary Covid-era exceptions to the Ryan Haight Act requirements for prescribing controlled substances. 

In the text of the new rule published May 10, 2023, which you can read in full here, DEA puts forth the details of the new, temporary rule that extends prescribing flexibilities. 

Background:

Under the Ryan Haight Online Pharmacy Consumer Protection Act of 2008 (the Ryan Haight Act), in-person evaluation, conducted by the prescriber, is required before any controlled substances may be prescribed, with very limited exceptions. 

One of those exceptions under the Ryan Haight Act includes public health emergencies declared by the Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS). With the federal Covid-19 public health emergency (PHE) set to expire May 11, 2023, the DEA needed to address the real-world implications of ending an...

The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) is temporarily extending current COVID-19 Public Health Emergency (PHE) flexibilities for prescribing controlled substances via telemedicine. 

As we covered in detail on this blog (PHE Ending: What You Need to Know), the federal PHE ends on May 11, 2023. At that point, absent action by the DEA or Congress, the end of the PHE would mean a return to in-person visits before providers could prescribe controlled substances.

Back in February, the DEA issued proposed rules that were intended to avoid a "prescribing cliff" where patients seen during the pandemic could no longer be seen under the permanent rules dating back to 2009. The medical community was not happy with the solution many saw as more restrictive than necessary and imposing barriers to care for many patients. 

In a statement, the DEA acknowledged that it received a record number of comments from industry stakeholders and policymakers during the public comment period...

Introduction

I'm Scott Rattigan, founder of Functional Lawyer. Way back in March of 2020, there was a lot of excitement because the federal government, the administration, at that time, put into place a lot of waivers for the pandemic, declaring a Public Health Emergency (PHE). Since the PHE is ending on May 11, 2023, there is much you need to know so that you're in compliance with all the laws going forward after that date. Basically, things will go back to the permanent rules. If you've been relying on these waivers or temporary rules for the past three years, this video is for you because you don't want to get into trouble by not knowing the rules. While there are dozens of rules that are going back into place May 11, or shortly thereafter, I want to focus on the two that have the most impact for our community here in functional medicine. First is cross state/interstate practice of telemedicine, and second is prescribing controlled substances via telemedicine. 

Cross...

Blog Overview

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) can be complicated.  What are you doing for HIPAA? How confident are you in your HIPAA plans?  More is needed than just a Notice of Privacy Practices and some HIPAA compliant software.  This is not an overwhelming task, but it does require you to follow a checklist and to be conscientious in complying with the HIPAA regulations.  By appointing a privacy and security officer, one person can oversee the HIPAA minimum requirements: create a HIPAA Policies & Procedures Manual, document HIPAA compliance, train employees to enforce HIPAA regulations & maintain a culture of privacy, and conduct an annual Security Risk Assessment. All of these will take some time to put in place, but once they are in place, they are easily enforced, and compliance is minimal. 

Introduction

You're probably not doing enough for HIPAA right now at this moment in time. Several times a week, I have...