Many education and business training programs purport to teach doctors and other health care professionals that they can expand their practice by practicing telemedicine across state lines, or even in other areas of the world, under the guise of calling yourself a “consultant” or “health coach” and by signing a fancy consultant agreement.

Planning to order tests, diagnose illnesses, treat ailments, and prescribe medication (whether taking insurance or not, or getting paid or not), without a license, is a clear violation of the law. License and medical boards, as well as prosecutors, see through this deception and will prosecute you to the fullest extent of the law whether you harm someone or not. If you are participating in medical practices that a doctor is licensed to do, then you need a license to practice medicine. It’s simply not a good idea for you to call yourself a health consultant and practice medicine across state lines at the same time.

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"What can health coaches do?" And, more specifically, "Can health coaches order lab tests and interpret them?"  These are some of the most frequent questions I get at Functional Lawyer, and today I'm going to give you my answer, some additional information, and what you can do about it if this is something you're planning to implement in your practice.

What Does a Health Coach do?

Before we jump into the details, we first need to define what health coaches actually do and what their job description is. Health coaches are part wellness-expert, part mentor-cheerleader, part accountability-buddy, and part psychological toolbox or life-hacks-giver who assist others to make better choices. Basically, health coaches support and act as behavior-change specialists, and they help bring people out of their ruts or encourage them to change certain habits. Health coaches can be helpful in that they respond in ways that are not judgmental or aggressively negative, especially...