Contracted Doctors not Employees of Indian Health Service

Doctors under contract with the Indian Health Service are not employees of the federal government and therefore the federal government is protected from suit under the Federal Tort Claims Act for any alleged malpractice by the doctor. A patient at the Carl Albert Indian Health Facility in Ada, Oklahoma sued the federal government under the Federal Tort Claims Act for malpractice due to substandard care received at the facility. The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Oklahoma ruled (Harjo v. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services -- No. 07-CV-184-JHP) that because the doctor was under contract and actually employed by Comp Health Inc., he was not a federal employee and thus the federal government had no liability. In reaching its decision that the doctor was not an employee it used a seven factor test established by the U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in Woodruff v. Covington, 389 F.3d 1117, 1126.