EXCLUSIVE CONTRACTS FOR MEDICAL IMAGING - A LESSON TO BE LEARNED FOR CANADA

Hospitals in the United States have used exclusive contracts to secure services, and professional groups have entered into such contracts to ensure access to a particular health care institution. Recently, for a variety of reasons, hospitals and management firms have voided these exclusive contracts. (Physicians insist that an exclusive contract pr events free access to the marketplace and that the voiding of these co ntracts deprives them of due process.) Hospitals and management firms argue that voiding an exclusive contract is an economic decision, that the physician's hospital privileges are unaffected and that claims of lack of due process are invalid. In this paper the authors will analy se several precedent cases to determine whether professional privilege s and exclusive contracts are interrelated to such a degree that physi cians should be legally represented in these ''purely'' financial deci sions. Also at issue is whether these privileges and service contracts should be considered as one and the same contract.