Professional Standards, Ethics, and Documentation
Domain 8 - Professional Standards, Ethics, and Documentation
The exam tests scope of practice, confidentiality, honest reporting, and the content of a defensible technical record.
Core rules
- Scope of practice. Technologists perform recordings, identify artifact and technical problems, and describe observations; they do not interpret the EEG or make diagnoses. Report concerns to the supervising physician.
- Credentials and competence. Maintain certification and continuing education; practice only procedures for which you are trained; recognize and report impaired or incompetent practice through proper channels.
- Confidentiality. Protect patient information under HIPAA and facility policy; do not discuss patients in public areas or post images on social media.
- Informed consent and voluntariness. Confirm that the patient understands the study, can refuse, and is free from coercion; document consent appropriately.
- Documentation. Include patient identifiers, date, indication, referring physician, technologist, montage, electrode impedances, calibration, medications, state during recording, activation procedures, events with times, artifacts, and any deviation from protocol.
- Corrections. Never alter a finished record; make corrections with a single line, initials, date, and reason.
Worked example
A physician asks the technologist to 'read' an EEG and write an impression for the chart. The correct response is to decline the interpretation, provide factual technical observations (for example, 'focal slowing at F8, no seizure recorded'), and route the study to the reading physician. Reasoning: interpretation is outside the technologist's scope and creates legal and ethical risk.
Traps
Signing for another technologist; backdating entries; describing a diagnosis rather than observations; sharing tracings without authorization; accepting a gift that could influence referral decisions.