Communication is the most basic attribute of being human, as it bridges individuals to their surroundings, educates, and offers a professional livelihood. However, when communication is impaired, it severely affects one’s quality of life. It is for this reason that there exist healthcare professionals, such as speech-language pathologists (SLPs), audiologists, and hearing aid dispensers (HADs), to ensure the proper functioning of communication skills.
The California Speech-Language Pathology, Audiology, & Hearing Aid Dispensers Board (SLPAHADB) is the regulatory agency that ensures consumers of the SLP, audiology, and HAD services are safe. It receives complaints and imposes disciplinary action on healthcare professionals found guilty of various violations that pose a risk to the public. If your professional license is threatened by an investigation or formal allegation from the board, you should consult the Los Angeles License Attorney to avoid or mitigate the board’s disciplinary action.
Duties of Speech Therapists
Also called SLPs, speech therapists are trained clinicians who work with individuals with speech problems due to various communication issues. Basic communication is a difficult task for some individuals, even though some take the ability to speak or hear lightly. If an individual struggles with communication, they seek speech therapy to regain their abilities.
As a speech therapist, your role is to address communication disorders relating to fluency, pronunciation, rhythm, and accent, whether regional or foreign. You require an SLPAHADB license to provide these services. Before the regulatory agency issues you a permit, you must undergo extensive education and practical training. Additionally, you must apply for a test, pay a fee, and pass the test to obtain a permit. You invest a lot of time and resources before you can attend to your first patient. Despite the sacrifice and dedication, a complaint can threaten your license.
The Role of an Audiologist
As an audiologist, you diagnose and treat various hearing impairments. When an individual begins to experience hearing problems or notices a change in their hearing, they come to you to restore their hearing or address the underlying disorder.
The inner ear controls balance. Therefore, patients with balance issues seek your diagnosis and treatment. Despite your efforts to help clients regain balance or restore their hearing, some will still accuse you of incompetence, unprofessional conduct, or other allegations, putting your permit on the line.
Duties of HADs
Chronic conditions, accidents, or old age can impair an individual’s hearing abilities. When this happens, the patient will require hearing aids to continue enjoying their quality of life. Your role as an HAD is to identify the cause of the hearing loss and advise on the most suitable hearing aids to restore hearing. To effectively perform your roles, you must stay up to date with the latest technological advancements in hearing aids and their features, so you can discuss these options in depth with patients and help them choose an option that suits their budget, lifestyle, and hearing needs.
Not all patients will be satisfied with the hearing aid recommendations you make, especially if the devices recommended do not achieve the intended goal. Some will allege you are not familiar with the latest hearing aids, causing the board to start to look into whether you participate in continuing education programs. Others will argue you are incompetent and made the wrong diagnosis; hence, the reason the treatment is not working. Even if these accusations could be false and the treatment might have failed because of other reasons, they could jeopardize your license.
So, as an HAD, SLP, or audiologist, you should partner with a competent license defense attorney anytime you face an investigation or complaint from your regulatory agency.
SLPAHADB takes all allegations seriously and gives them a lot of weight. Even if they issue you the license and regulate your profession, their focus is to protect the public, meaning they are not on your side. The allegations you take lightly could lead to a licensing suspension, citation, or revocation. So, take any accusation with a lot of weight and contact your license defense lawyer immediately after you receive a notice of investigation or a statement of issues. Your legal representative will work tirelessly to ensure you continue practicing while investigations are ongoing. Additionally, the attorney will represent you in the administrative hearing to ensure a fair verdict.
Duties of California SLPAHADB
California established SLPAHADB to protect patients and members of the public with communication problems from unsafe or poor-standard speech-language pathology, audiology, and HAD services. Even though the board is not biased against its licensees, it does not protect their rights or interests, as its mission is to ensure public safety. The story from your patient or claimant is normally more believable to the board than your side of the story, making it crucial to retain the services of a skilled license attorney in your corner to protect your rights and interests.
If you visit the board’s website, you will see its disciplinary guidelines, which are applied during the administrative hearing. These rules set the standards for receiving complaints, conducting investigations, handling formal accusations, and conducting administrative proceedings. The administrative law judge (ALJ) has the discretion to deviate from these standard rules depending on the facts of the case, although the board has the final decision. It can adopt, adjust, or disregard the ALJ findings.
Common Accusations You Can Face from the Board
You can run afoul of the SLPAHADB even when acting in the patient’s or client’s best interests. The common accusations you can face include:
- Professional misconduct
- Insurance fraud
- Receiving kickbacks for recommending certain hearing aids
- Paying or receiving money for referrals
- Hiring unlicensed assistants
- Substance or alcohol abuse while on duty
- False advertisement
- Gross negligence and incompetence
- Having a criminal record with a substantial relationship to your profession
The common complaints you face in this profession revolve around negligence and incompetence. A patient can argue that, as an audiologist, you failed to refer them to a doctor after identifying an abnormal symptom, or that, as an SLP, you made an inaccurate diagnosis when treating a patient with swallowing difficulties, causing them injuries. As an HAD, you could be accused of making the wrong diagnosis and recommending the wrong hearing aids. All these accusations revolve around gross negligence.
The claimant can file a negligence claim if they believe you owed them a duty of care but breached this duty, leading to losses or injuries. By lodging this claim, the claimant raises the issue of your competence and ability to abide by the industry’s set standards. These claims can be severe if proven true; the board will instruct you to compensate the claimant for all damages and losses incurred due to your negligence. Additionally, the board can suspend or revoke your permit to protect the public from further harm.
Your regulatory agency does not investigate all the claims it receives. They first determine if a complaint has merit and is worth pursuing. If the complaint can be substantiated, they investigate the said misconduct or injury and its validity. If a complaint is true, the board holds you responsible.
When defending against a claim, evidence is paramount. The person lodging a claim against you has all the records of your interactions to substantiate their allegations, including the diagnostic tests performed, the injuries sustained, the treatment administered, and the continuing symptoms. You will require a skilled attorney to review these records to show that they are inaccurate or misconstrued.
The claimant is the one making the accusations, so they must prove facts to show you engaged in a violation. These facts include:
- The type and gravity of injuries sustained due to your negligence or incompetence
- How the negligence led to the breach of care owed to the patient
- The existence of a relationship between you and the patient
The Process Leading to Disciplinary Measures
Anyone can be a complainant. A complaint can originate from the public, self-reporting requirements, court reports, or reports from other regulatory agencies. The board prioritizes cases by severity, with the most severe cases given priority. Also, it only investigates substantiated complaints. If a claim has merit or credibility, the regulatory agency initiates an investigation to determine whether the case should proceed or be dropped.
Investigations
Before the regulatory agency commences an investigation into the allegation against you, they send a notice. The notice contains a copy of the accusation and the instructions you should follow to file a response within the stipulated time. You should have your attorney review the complaint and the instructions provided to ensure they prepare a statement to respond to the accusations. Additionally, your attorney will help you prepare for the interview with board-appointed investigators and represent you during these meetings to protect your interests.
A seasoned attorney will help you give the correct answers to various questions and advise on when to exercise your right to remain silent to avoid divulging details that could implicate you. If you cooperate and answer questions correctly during the interview, the accusation against you could be resolved before the case proceeds.
If the case is not resolved, the case will move to the next stage, which is the formal accusation phase. At this stage, the board could impose an interim suspension on your license pending the case’s conclusion. Being unable to work before the accusations against you are corroborated can hurt your finances and reputation. Fortunately, an experienced attorney can request that the licensing board lift the suspension pending case determination, which can take months or, in worst-case scenarios, years.
Formal Accusation
If they believe they have a strong case for an administrative hearing, they will file a formal accusation with the attorney general’s office. Also, they will send you a notice of formal accusation and statement of issues. The only severe violations that reach this stage include having a conviction substantially related to the profession, professional misconduct, or substance addiction or abuse.
When you receive the formal accusation, you have fifteen days to submit a defense notice. You should involve an attorney from the start of the case because deadlines are of the essence. If you file a defense after the deadline has passed, the board issues a default order. So, have your attorney evaluate the formal accusation and challenge all the claims made within 15 days.
If your defense is strong, you can negotiate a settlement or case dismissal. However, if none of these is achieved, the case goes to the ALJ for the administrative proceeding. In this proceeding, your defense attorney must take all measures to ensure you obtain a favorable outcome. The attorney will cross-examine the board’s witnesses, submit exculpatory evidence and circumstances in mitigation for an acquittal or lenient disciplinary measures, poke holes in the prosecutor’s evidence, and submit witness testimony in your favor.
If your defense is successful, the ALJ will dismiss your accusation, and it will not appear anywhere on your professional record. However, if the accusations are true, the ALJ will recommend disciplinary measures in accordance with the board’s guidelines. The board can adopt, reject, or adjust the disciplinary actions. Whatever unfavorable decision you receive from the board, you have 30 days to file an appeal if the outcome is not satisfactory.
Common Penalties
The board can impose several disciplinary actions depending on the gravity of your complaint and its circumstances. These include:
- License suspension or revocation
- A stay on revocation in exchange for a probation program
- Citation and fines
- Reprimand letter
Even what seems like a lenient disciplinary measure can have devastating consequences on your license, making it crucial to fight the accusations aggressively to obtain a dismissal.
Substance Abuse and Board Diversion Programs
If your capacity to provide quality services according to the standards set by the board is compromised by alcohol or substance addiction, the licensing agency can impose a diversion program in place of a license suspension or revocation. The program gives you the chance to undergo addiction treatment and rehabilitation because the addiction was the reason for disciplinary measures.
Before agreeing to a diversion program, you should consult with your attorney to understand the terms, including the available intervention plans and program duration. Doing so ensures that you enroll in a program whose terms you can satisfy because failure to satisfy all the terms attracts the initial disciplinary action. Your attorney can negotiate the terms of the program to ensure they are favorable and easy to comply with.
Find a Skilled License Defense Attorney Near Me
If the speech-language pathology, audiology & hearing aid dispensers board has put you under investigation for a violation, rejected your license application, or you want to appeal the board’s decision, you should consult an experienced license attorney.
At Los Angeles License Attorney, we will help you navigate the disciplinary process so that you can continue helping people with communication needs. Additionally, we will help with your license application or appeal for a fair verdict. Contact us at 424-554-1140 to schedule an appointment.
