Duty to Defend versus Duty to Indemnify

The duty to defend is the obligation to provide and pay for a lawyer. The duty to indemnify is the obligation to pay a judgment or settlement. The first is broader than the second and is generally triggered if any allegation in the complaint is potentially covered.

This distinction is the most useful thing an operator can know when a carrier disputes coverage. Senior care complaints plead many theories at once, deliberately, and in most states a complaint containing one potentially covered allegation obligates the carrier to defend the whole case even while reserving rights on the rest. That argument is available more often than operators realize. Note also the alternative structure: some senior care forms are written as indemnity policies with a duty to reimburse rather than a duty to defend, in which case you select and pay counsel and seek reimbursement. That structure gives you control and gives you cash flow exposure, and it should be identified before a claim rather than discovered during one.