Medical Justice Blog

Medical license renewals have morphed over time to be quite involved. The Board of Medicine is charged with keeping the public safe. This includes making sure that licensees have no medical or mental health conditions which, with or without treatment, could impact taking care of … Read more

Not all medical and dental procedures are completed in one setting. They are staged. A common example is a patient needs new teeth. Impressions are taken. Temporaries are placed. The lab fashions the new implants. They are placed down the road. Patients often pay upfront … Read more

The reasonable interpretation of language in an insurance policy dictates its coverage. Sometimes the definition of a word can cost a carrier or an insured millions, if not billions. When the World Trade Towers were destroyed in a terrorist attack in 2001, there were a … Read more

When I was a resident, we had a weekly Morbidity and Mortality Conference. That was the euphemism for what most called it, Death and Donuts. That moniker was not meant to be disrespectful. It was merely an acknowledgement that death did happen at the hospital. … Read more

We continue with our series of general educational articles penned by one attorney, an MD, JD, giving you a view of the world through a malpractice plaintiff attorney’s eyes. This attorney is a seasoned veteran.  The series includes a number of pearls on how to … Read more

A recent Wall Street Journal article reported that only 3% of patients with Hepatitis C in prisons are receiving the newest medications which have a cure rate over 90%. This means most are not receiving these medications. The reason is cost. Each treatment cost up … Read more

As physicians, we learn we must inform the patient of their options. Each patient has a different tolerance for risk. Some want aggressive treatment. Some want conservative management. The patient decides what should be done. I always thought it awkward to merely present a smorgasbord … Read more

I spent some time over the weekend scanning physician responses to this ethical conundrum. An endocrinologist was caring for a man who spent years taking anabolic steroids. He developed hypogonadotropic hypogonadism with a low sperm count. He was now living clean and ready to start … Read more

We continue with our series of general educational articles penned by one attorney, an MD, JD, giving you a view of the world through a malpractice plaintiff attorney’s eyes. This attorney is a seasoned veteran.  The series includes a number of pearls on how to … Read more

Jeffrey Segal, MD, JD Published in Medscape: May 14, 2015 (reprinted with permission) http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/844060 How Would You Have Handled Patients Like These? Being sued for malpractice is a traumatic experience. The odds of being sued at least once over one’s career are high.[1] Doctors typically have sufficient … Read more