Patient Safety and Whistleblower Protections Act

Protection from Retaliation: Health care practitioners cannot be retaliated against for reporting patient safety concerns, such as staffing practices or equipment sufficiency, to authorities or supervisors (Section 3(a)).

Legal Recourse for Whistleblowers: Individuals who face retaliation can sue for actual damages, attorney's fees, and punitive damages up to $1,000,000 (Section 4(a)).

Removal of Restrictive Contracts: Any contract provision that stops a provider from speaking truthfully about health care quality or communicating safety concerns is considered null and void (Section 3(e)).

Freedom of Employment: Practitioners who report safety concerns are released from non-competition agreements related to the facility they reported (Section 3(f)).

Anonymous Reporting: People providing services in Medicare-participating facilities will benefit from new required mechanisms for anonymous reporting and processes to investigate those concerns (Section 6(a)).

Legal Protections in Liability Cases: Communications about safety concerns made before a lawsuit is filed cannot be used to make a negative inference about the quality of care provided by the practitioner (Section 5).

Risk of Lawsuits for "Bad Faith": Health care practitioners can still be sued in civil court if an independent investigation determines their safety concerns were not valid and were communicated in bad faith (Section 3(g)).

Procedural Hurdles for Legal Action: Before filing a retaliation lawsuit, a practitioner must first file complaints with State authorities and, if applicable, the Joint Commission on Hospital Accreditation, and wait for investigations to conclude or for 180 days to pass (Section 4(d)).