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Establishing: Legal Liability and Risk Reduction

Different localities are subject to different legal liability laws and standards. So we urge you to seek local legal counsel to help you understand the legal and professional guidelines affecting your MRC volunteers and your organization.

Once you understand the specifics governing and in some cases restricting volunteer activities, especially for medical and health professionals, it will be important to include these in your policies and as part of training your volunteers. You will likely have informed your volunteer prospects of the risks that may be associated with their work for the MRC. Once they join your team, however, you will want to help them understand the specifics of legal and professional standards under which they will be operating.

Over and above those technical details—which are important to know and understand—it is equally important to realize that liability laws, in principle, are intended to protect citizens from negligent or faulty behavior on the part of individuals or organizations, which negligent or faulty behavior then leads to unintended harm. What this means in practice is that efforts to protect your MRC volunteers from liability risks will also reduce the unintended harm they might cause those they are truly meaning to help. These harm reduction measures and principles will become part of your policies and procedures that volunteers are trained to understand and implement.

While thinking about the principles that underlie risk reduction, you may discover ways of reducing risk that exceed the standards normally required in your community or state. Implementing additional risk reduction measures can only benefit everyone involved. Don't hesitate to be a leader in promoting risk and harm reduction in your community, if you have that contribution to make.

In general, the effort you put into developing and communicating those operating policies and procedures will also help reduce the harm that might otherwise arise from a less thoughtful or under-planned utilization of your volunteers.

Legal Liability and Risk Reduction: Action Steps

Find out everything you can about the laws in your area that govern volunteers, "Good Samaritan" acts, medical and health practices, and general liability.
Seek legal counsel to determine the best policies and procedures to have in place to reduce the risk of harm and legal liability for your volunteers and your organization, given your local laws.
Don't hesitate to implement policies and procedures that exceed your community-set standards. Be a leader in reducing risk of harm in your community.
Train your volunteers to understand the importance of these liability and risk reduction policies and procedures. Make sure they understand concretely how to implement them.

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Last Updated on 5/25/2006