Locum work · manual techniques · disciplinary complaints
Professional indemnity – Physiotherapist
As a self-employed physiotherapist you work with your hands on someone else's body. Your biggest risk is not a mistake in a report, but injury arising during or after a treatment.
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Deze pagina in het Nederlands: Beroepsaansprakelijkheid – Fysiotherapeut.
The calculator and the quote form below are in Dutch. Prefer to do this in English? Email info@finassverzekert. nl or call 072 - 509 24 56 and we will take it from there.
Work out for yourself what it would cost.
Enter your details; you will receive a proposal within one working day.
- We compare the offerings of several insurers
- An adviser checks whether the cover suits your activities
- We arrange the switch, including cancellation
A premium indication, not personal advice. Prefer to talk it through? Call 072 - 509 24 56.
In brief
You conclude a treatment agreement with every patient; Article 7:453 of the Dutch Civil Code requires you to exercise the care of a good care provider and to follow the professional standard. In physiotherapy, being held liable is rarely about paperwork. It is about a herniated disc made worse by a mobilisation, a pneumothorax after dry needling, a fracture in an elderly patient during exercise therapy, or a red flag missed so that a referral came too late.
That means you need cover that includes injury arising from professional practice. A policy that only covers pure financial loss is too narrow for this profession; conversely, an ordinary AVB specifically does not cover injury arising from the treatment. For allied health professionals there are therefore combined forms, described on the page about liability insurance for care and welfare.
If you work as a locum or under a contract for services in someone else's practice, do not assume that you are covered by the practice policy. Often you are not an insured person there, and in the contract you also take on a indemnity. Liability you accept by contract that would not exist without that contract is excluded on virtually every policy. The general explanation of the product is on the hub page, and the points to note for self-employed professionals are at professional indemnity for self-employed professionals.
This page deals with one situation. The full overview is on Compare professional indemnity insurance (BAV).
Points to note in your policy
Four things that go wrong for a self-employed physiotherapist more often than the level of the sum insured.
Your range of treatments must match your application
Dry needling, manipulation of the cervical spine, shockwave therapy, ultrasound and variants of dry needling are assessed separately by insurers. If you carry out a technique you have not declared, the insurer can rely on Articles 7:928 and 7:930 of the Dutch Civil Code: where a statement made before the contract was concluded was incorrect or incomplete, payment can be reduced or refused. So declare your full range, including what you rarely do.
Informed consent is your evidence
Article 7:448 of the Dutch Civil Code requires you to inform the patient about the treatment and its risks, and Article 7:450 of the Dutch Civil Code requires consent. In a claim after manipulation or a needle technique, the discussion almost always turns on whether the risk was discussed. A note in the file that you named the alternatives and the risk is the cheapest prevention there is. The duty to keep records follows from Article 7:454 DCC.
A disciplinary complaint is not a claim for damages
As a professional registered under the Wet BIG you are subject to the disciplinary law of Article 47 of the Dutch Individual Healthcare Professions Act (Wet BIG). Disciplinary proceedings do not produce compensation, so in principle liability insurance does not come into play. The cost of defending yourself is often only covered if a separate section for disciplinary law assistance is included, or through legal expenses insurance for self-employed professionals.
What the policy does not pay out
Outside the cover are, among other things: the repaying your own fee where there is dissatisfaction, fines and disciplinary sanctions, loss caused by intent or wilful recklessness under Article 7:952 of the Dutch Civil Code, and claims already known to you before the commencement date. The patient's belongings in your keeping also fall under the care, custody and control exclusion.
What does your premium depend on?
- Annual turnover from treatments: the basis on which the premium is set
- Techniques used: manipulation and needle techniques are weighted more heavily
- Patient group: geriatrics and sport have different injury patterns
- Way of working: your own practice, locum work or secondment through an agency
- Sum insured and excess: per claim and per insurance year
- Retroactive and run-off periods: decisive when switching insurers or closing down
Insurers weigh these details differently. That is where your saving is.
What is covered
| Situation | AVB | BAV |
|---|---|---|
| A patient is left with neurological symptoms after a manipulation of the cervical vertebrae | No | Yes |
| A collapsed lung occurs after dry needling and the patient is admitted to hospital | No | Yes |
| You stand in at a colleague's practice and the patient brings a claim against you personally | No | Provided that |
| A patient trips over a loose cable in your treatment room | Yes | No |
| The coat with a wallet that a patient hung up at your practice disappears during the treatment | No | No |
| A patient asks for his treatment costs back because his symptoms have not improved | No | No |
Injury arising from the treatment itself is only covered on a form of policy written for healthcare professions.
Frequently asked questions
This is what people ask us most.
I work as a locum in a practice. Am I insured through that practice?
Usually not automatically. A practice policy covers the practice owner and the staff. A self-employed professional with his own contract for services often falls outside it. Ask for written confirmation that you are included as an insured person, or keep your own policy. Two covers side by side is better than none at all at the moment a patient brings a claim against you personally.
A patient says my treatment made his symptoms worse. What now?
Report it to your insurer at once; Article 7:941 of the Dutch Civil Code requires you to do so as soon as you are reasonably aware of the claim. Admit no liability and make no promise of compensation, because virtually every policy expressly prohibits that. The insurer will have a medical adviser assess the causal link between the treatment and the worsening of the symptoms.
As a self-employed professional I can be off work myself. Does this insurance help with that?
No. Professional indemnity insurance pays a third party who brings a claim against you, not you yourself. Your own income during illness or injury runs through disability insurance. For a physiotherapist who works with their hands, the definition of the occupation in that policy matters at least as much as the level of the benefit.
And if patient data leaks from my record system?
Then it is not a professional error but a data breach. Investigation, recovery, notifying the data subjects and liability towards those data subjects belong on cyber insurance for physiotherapists. A fine from the Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens (the Dutch data protection authority) is not insurable anywhere. That is a sanction and not compensation.
Read more
Within Beroepsaansprakelijkheidsverzekering
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