Professional Conduct, Discipline, and Patient Records
Professional conduct
The Board enforces both statutory grounds and rule-based standards. Expect questions on confidentiality, informed consent, honesty in advertising, avoiding conflicts of interest, and maintaining boundaries. A licensee must not practice while impaired, must not aid unlicensed practice, and must report certain conduct as Board rules require. Patient information is confidential and may be released only with valid authorization, as required by law, or under a recognized exception.
Records
Create a contemporaneous record for every patient encounter: history, examination findings, diagnoses, treatment, prescriptions, informed consent, and follow-up. Records belong to the practice, but patients have a right of access under Maine law and HIPAA. Release a complete copy on proper authorization, charge only an allowed fee, and document the release. Do not alter a record after a complaint; a late correction must be clearly identified, dated, and explained. Retention must satisfy the Board's rule and any longer applicable requirement.
Discipline process
A complaint typically leads to Board investigation, possible informal resolution, and, if warranted, a hearing with notice and an opportunity to respond. Sanctions include reprimand, suspension, revocation, probation, fines, CE, and practice restrictions. The Board may also act on a criminal conviction or a disciplinary action in another state.
Worked example. A patient's attorney sends a signed authorization for records. The office may release the records covered by the authorization, but not unrelated financial or family information. If the patient later disputes the bill, the office should not rewrite the clinical note; it should keep the original and add a separate, dated billing note.
Traps that cost marks: withholding records solely to collect a bill when law requires access; discussing a patient's care in a public area; and assuming a malpractice suit replaces Board discipline-it does not.