We’re fans of the British professional liability system. Across the Pond, the loser pays the legal fees of the winner. Not surprisingly, there, medical malpractice cases are screened more diligently before going forward. The cost of getting it wrong is stiff.
So, what happened to the convicted Lockerbie bomber? His tale has nothing to do with medical malpractice, but everything to do with how “experts” can control the outcome of a legal case.
John Stossel recently wrote an excellent editorial entitled “Parasitic Tort Lawyers.” OK, anything with that title will get our attention. While we concede that the headline is a little over the top (although not much) the article is well thought out – and echoes what Medical Justice has said for years. Stossel begins,
Tort lawyers lie. They say their product liability suits are good for us. But their lawsuits rarely make our lives better. They make lawyers and a few of their clients better off — but for the majority of us, they make life much worse.”
Why is this so? Because people are, for the most part, rational beings. If I touch a hot stove and burn my hand, I learn not to touch a hot stove again. Painful lesson, but lesson learned. How does this make our lives worse? When a person gets burned, whatever the reason, that person will naturally avoid that stimulus in the future. If that person is a doctor, and that stimulus is a frivolous lawsuit, the future behavior will be to avoid that stimulus (the frivolous suit) by “protecting themselves” via defensive medicine. If the effects of that behavior only impacted the doctor, then no real harm done. However, that rational, protective behavior (read defensive medicine) impacts our entire healthcare system. So much so, that some studies estimate the impact between $200 and $400 billion dollars per year. That’s billion with a B.
MAG Journal June 2010 – p 16 By: Newt Gingrich and Jeffrey Segal, MD, JD, FACS Forum: Health law will worsen doctor shortage Posted: Saturday, April 24, 2010 By Newt Gingrich and Jeff Segal Now that President Obama has signed his health care legislation into law, the focus is supposed to be on the millions … Read more
You woke up with a pulse today. No matter what else happens, you are off to a good start. The practice of medicine can be frustrating. If all you had to do was make a diagnosis, remove a tumor, or comfort a patient’s family, though still challenging, the job would be easier. Some events give … Read more
Some professional liability carriers are offering discounts to physicians who have implemented electronic medical records (“EMR”). Further, under the stimulus package which was signed into law, doctors who meaningfully use EMR by 2011 will be eligible for federal subsidies up to $44,000 per practitioner. That is a chunk of change.
A number of EMR strategies are competing for acceptance.
Facial Plast Surg Clin N Am May 2010; Page 237 – 244 By: Jeffrey Segal, MD, JD, FACS and Michael Sacopulos, JD Abstract: The use of photography is an integral part of any plastic surgery practice. Photographs are part of the patient’s medical record and thus are covered by both federal and state privacy laws. … Read more
Dermatology Times March 2010, Volume 31, Number 3; Pages 1, 24, 27, 28 Contributor: Jeffrey Segal, MD, JD, FACS Click here to read the full article
VEIN Magazine Spring 2010 – Volume 3 Issue 2 – p 42, 43 By: Jeffrey Segal, MD, JD, FACS Michael Sacopulos, JD Download legal_consequences_of_physician_employment
The ramifications of the Illinois Supreme Court’s recent decision to overturn caps on malpractice suits are clear. Frivolous malpractice suits will increase. Physicians will be discouraged from practicing medicine within that state. And access to health care providers for the people of Illinois will be restricted because off this decision. Medical Malpractice rates will increase, and the costs of healthcare will go back up. Bad as that is, the implications of that decision may be even more devastating.
Our society’s rule is a rule of Law. The Illinois state medical malpractice judgment cap law wasn’t instituted until 2005. There will still be consequences, of course, but it’s within keeping of the separation of powers for a law to be repealed by a Supreme Court shortly after it has been enacted. It’s not a question of whether they can do it, but if they should. It’s still the less than unanimous decision of the IL SC that is overriding the will of their entire legislature, presumably representing the will of the People. One would expect the Supreme Court to tread more lightly, in absence of a matter of prejudice. Yet their decision seems to support prejudice. Jackpot trial lawyers aren’t filing frivolous suits against indigent people. They’re going after doctors, based on the prejudicial (and erroneous) notion that they can afford to be taken to the cleaners. They may claim that it’s protecting the citizen’s right to redress in civil court, but the law didn’t cap the actual total of the suit, only awards for noneconomic damages. $500,000 in cases against doctors and $1 million against hospitals seems more than ample for the patient’s trouble, pain, suffering, etc.
We recently heard from a surgeon who told us about one of his upstanding patients.
The patient wrote a post-dated check for a surgical procedure. Surgery went well. Unbeknownst to the doctor, the patient stopped payment on her check. She followed up in the office the next day for routine post-op evaluation. No problems were noted. The patient was instructed to return at two weeks. She was a no-show. She resurfaced in the emergency room of a hospital 5 weeks post-op with an E.coli wound infection. Anyone have a hypothesis as to how the wound became infected?
Fortunately, the patient recovered with minimal intervention. Several weeks later, an attorney sent a note asking for the records.
