Nutritionists Are At Risk Too. Get A Policy Today To Protect Your Business

Good nutrition has the power to fight diseases and increase a person’s quality of life. There’s a reason you got into your profession—you believe in the importance of eating well. After all, food can have an incredible impact on a person’s health.

As you work with clients to change their eating habits, remember to protect your practice too. Nutritionists aren’t immune to lawsuits, and in fact, are more at risk than ever before. Just imagine if one of your clients has an allergic reaction, loses too much weight, or even chokes on food you recommend.

That’s why it’s so important to protect your private practice. If you’re not sure where to start, Simply Business can help. We’re an online insurance platform that specializes in protecting small business owners, like you. We help dietitians and other professionals find affordable liability insurance to protect their growing businesses.

Not only that, but we make the process as easy as possible. You can count on us to help you find a policy in 10 minutes or less. If you’re ready to get started now, just answer a few quick questions about your practice. Then we’ll recommend policies that may work for you.

Liability Insurance for Dietitians:

• Professional liability insurance
• General liability insurance
• Workers compensation insurance (if you have employees)

### Liability Insurance Benefits:


• Pay for the costs of certain claims.
• Cover the costs of damage caused by negligence.
• Show that you’re trustworthy and credible.
• Meet legal requirements (depending on your location).

What Type of Insurance Do I Need for My Dietitian Practice?

As a self-employed nutritionist, you need affordable liability insurance. In your field, anything can happen. Your recommendations can influence weight, food allergies, digestion, and can even help prevent diseases. But what happens if something goes wrong? Just imagine if one of your clients has a bad reaction to food, chokes, gets sick, or worse.

You can easily get blamed for negligence and have to pay the consequences. To help protect yourself, we recommend you get these policies:

Professional Liability Insurance

Food has the power to heal or hurt people. As a result, there’s a lot of risk in what you do. A client can easily blame you for an unexpected illness or emergency. Even if it wasn’t your fault, you may have to protect yourself from a lawsuit.

If you have professional liability insurance (PL), your policy can help protect you financially. It may also cover some or all of the costs of hiring a lawyer or obtaining evidence. If you have an employee working for you, it may help cover them too.

Let’s look at an example. Imagine a patient of yours has a severe allergic reaction to the foods you recommended in a new diet plan. As a result, your patient is rushed to the emergency room for immediate treatment. After the incident, you’re accused of negligence in your care and sued for damages.

If you have professional liability insurance, your policy can help protect you. If can cover some or all of the costs of hiring a lawyer and the cost of medical bills up to your policy’s limit. With coverage, you’re less likely to have to pay for damages out of your own pocket.

Here’s the reality—a lawsuit can happen to anyone, including nutritionists. That’s why it’s so important to secure PL insurance as soon as possible. It can help cover the costs associated with:

• Negligence or alleged negligence
• Obtaining a defense lawyer
• Omissions or alleged omissions
• Claims and damages
• And more

However, PL insurance usually doesn’t cover:

• Intentional acts and omissions
• Property damage
• Medical expenses
• Bodily injury
• And more

Commercial General Liability Insurance

Where do you meet with clients? Whether you have a home office, or you rent or own space, you need commercial general liability insurance (GL insurance). This policy can help cover costs if there’s an accident or damage to your workspace.

Accidents can happen anywhere and at any time, and you have to be especially careful if a client meets you at your office. At Simply Business, we recommend all that all self-employed dietitians get GL insurance. It can help cover costly medical bills and injury claims, which average about $30,000! Just imagine paying that amount on your own. For many dietitians, it’s enough to put their practices under water.

Here’s an example of how GL insurance works. Let’s say a client visits your office to discuss a new diet plan you created. During his visit, a piece of your ceiling falls down and hits him on the head, severely injuring him. As a result, your client is rushed to the hospital and treated for a head injury. Shortly thereafter, he sues you for the costs of his medical bills and loss of work.

Fortunately, if you have general liability insurance, it can help cover the costs associated with:

• Bodily injury to another person
• Third-party property damage
• Personal and advertising injury
• Medical expenses
• And more

It’s important to know that most general liability insurance policies don’t cover:

• Damage to your own personal property
• Professional services
• Workers compensation or injury to your employees
• Damage to your work
• Automobiles while in business use
• Expected or intentional injury or damage
• And more

Workers Compensation Insurance

If your practice is quickly growing, chances are, you’ve hired someone to help you. Even if you only have one part-time or full-time employee, you need to consider getting workers compensation insurance. It can help cover costs if an employee is injured or sick on the job.

Depending on where you live, you may also be required by law to get workers compensation insurance. That’s because the law is trying to protect you from some pretty expensive claims, averaging about $41,000 each! Plus, work injuries are fairly common in the United States. In fact in 2018, Americans reported a total of $170.8 billion in workers compensation claims. That’s a huge chunk of change.

But here’s the good news. If you have a workers compensation policy, you don’t have to worry. You policy can help cover costs associated with:

• Medical payments
• Lost wages
• Rehabilitation expenses
• Death benefits
• And more

Why Should I Get Nutritionist Liability Insurance?

As a nutritionist, you’re at risk for getting sued. Whether you work with patients in a healthcare setting, the general public, or with corporate clients, anyone can accuse you of negligence. It doesn’t matter if your clients are high-risk patients or healthy athletes, anyone can have a bad reaction to food or get injured while visiting you.

If you don’t have liability insurance, you’re taking a huge financial risk. Maybe you’re just starting your practice and want to keep costs down until you grow your client base. Or maybe you don’t think someone would actually sue a nutritionist.

Unfortunately, 43% of small business owners say they’ve been sued or have dealt with a threatened lawsuit. It’s more common than you may think. Just one mistake or an unfortunate accident can put your practice—and everything you’ve built—at risk. Trust us, the cost of getting a policy is worth it, especially in today’s climate where lawsuits are common.

Just imagine if one of these claims is brought against you. Could you cover the costs all on your own?

• Reputational Harm — $50,000
• Client Injury or Damage — $30,000
• Client Slip and Fall — $20,000

If you have liability insurance, you can feel more relaxed. If an unexpected incident happens, you can enjoy peace of mind knowing your business is protected.

At Simply Business, we don’t want you to worry. After all, you should be focused on helping your clients change their diets and lifestyles. Leave it to us to help you find coverage that’s affordable and fully covers your practice.

Are you ready to get a policy today? All you have to do is go to our online quote form. We’ll ask you a few, quick questions about your business and then recommend liability policies that may meet your needs. If you need a certificate of insurance (COI), we can help you with that too. We can prepare one that you can share with clients and vendors.

If you’re ready to get started now, get your free quote today!

Nutritionist Insurance FAQs

Why Choose Simply Business?

You’re an expert in nutrition and health. But chances are, you’re not as familiar with insurance. At Simply Business, we know choosing liability insurance can be stressful and complicated, but we also think it doesn’t have to be that way.

We’re here to make the experience hassle-free. Our online quote form simplifies the shopping process, making it easy to compare affordable policies from top insurers in just minutes. In addition, our licensed insurance agents are readily available on the phone to help you choose a plan and understand how it works.

Nutritionists all over the nation also choose Simply Business because:

• We deliver timely information. We’re 100% focused on helping small business owners, like you, succeed in a competitive marketplace. That’s why we share business advice on topics like growing your business and protecting it long term. You can subscribe to our blog, newsletter, and online communities to get helpful tips.

• We meet the needs of nutritionists. Whether you just started your practice, or you’ve been building it for a while, we understand that you want to keep costs down. You can trust us to help you get full coverage at an affordable price.


• We make insurance simple. In the insurance industry, there’s a lot of jargon. We’re here to cut through it. Our team can help you understand how to find a policy and use your insurance if you experience a claim.

As a nutritionist, you have an important job to do. After all, your recommendations can greatly influence the health and wellbeing of others. At Simply Business, we’re here to support you as you help your clients improve their lives.

This content is intended to be used for informational purposes only. It is not intended to provide legal, tax, accounting, investment, or any other form of professional advice.