America is facing a medical liability crisis which already has resulted in decreased patient access to healthcare and rising health costs. The Pacific Research Institute (a not for profit, nonpartisan organization), was the first to do a detailed study quantifying the total cost of tort litigation in our country. They have calculated that the excessive tort costs in the United State due to lawsuit abuse totals $589 billion each year.(1)
The law suit abuse by trial lawyers has been a major contributor to the increasing shortage of primary care physicians(Internists, family doctor and pediatricians) plus other high risk specialists specialists(neurosurgeons, orthopedic surgeons, obstetricians and general surgeons.) There is no point in talking about increasing healthcare to the 47 million uninsured people or trying to providing “Universal Healthcare” until the doctor shortage problem is solved.
The state of Texas faced a similar problem six years ago and serves as an example of how this problem can be solved. Texas has become a model for medical liability reform, but prior to the passage of medical liability reform, Texas presented a very difficult environment for doctors, hospitals and consumers of healthcare. Frivolous malpractice law suits were rampant and doctors were leaving the state in droves. At the height of the crisis, Texas ranked 48th out of 50 states in terms of physician manpower(2) Medical liability insurance went up as high as 128 percent in four years and 6,500 doctors were forced to practice without any liability coverage at all. Large numbers of patients whose doctors had left the state could not find replacements and were forced to seek care in emergency rooms because they could not find a doctor who would take new patients. Many of the remaining physicians were exhausted trying to keep up with the demand for healthcare and considering joining those who had already left the state.
Though 85 percent of these frivolous lawsuits failed, doctors paid tens of thousands of dollars in unreimbursed expenses to defend themselves.
The numerous medical malpractice law suits caused the physicians who remained in Texas to practice “defensive medicine” ordering many more tests and procedures that they would not ordinarily have ordered to evaluate the patients’ medical condition. Trial lawyers often tried to find one test or procedure the doctor did not order that he could convince the medically unsophisticated jury that was the reason the patient had a problem.
No other country in the world permits trial lawyers to practice the way they do in the United States. The trial lawyers not only drove up the cost of health insurance, much of which was paid by business, but they also directly attacked businesses with the same type of frivolous lawsuits. Businesses fled Texas and new ones did not locate in Texas. The economy was depressed, businesses closed and many people lost their jobs.
In 2003, the Texas Legislature passed medical liability reforms and which was approved by Texas voters who voted for the reforms in a constitutional amendment.
The reforms capped medical malpractice noneconomic jury awards at $750,000. ($250,000 for doctors, $250,000 for the first hospital or other health-care facilities) on lawsuit judgments for non-economic damages, such as Pain and suffering. There is no cap on actual damages, such as medical bills or lost income. For death related case, economic damages were capped at $1.6 million. The reforms created stricter requirements for expert testimony and a tougher negligence standard for emergency medical cases.
The results after medical liability reform were spectacular as physicians by the thousand voted with their feet coming to Texas from the states that had not enacted tort reform. At one point there were so many doctors applying to Texas medical licensing authority that they had a six month backlog in processing applications. Insurance costs have continued to come down over the past 5 years and the state had a financial boom with thousands of new high paying jobs created. In 2005, Texas became the only state to be removed from the American Medical Association’s list of crisis states.(3) Texas proved that medical liability reform works.
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View the video produced by the Texans for Lawsuit Reform which shows what happened before and after reforms below.
I am a physician and have seen many of my associates hit with frivolous lawsuits in certain parts of the state.
In Florida the trial lawyers have been able to get a constutional amendment in that is called "three strikes and you are out", if they have three finding against the doctors as part of a medical liability suits. Experience is that after getting one finding against them the doctors will no longer cover the emergency room. If they get a second finding in one of the states judicial rat holes,
then they immediately transfer the difficult case to a medical center or move out of the state.Florida is rapdly being depleted of some of its best doctors who are willing to take difficult meedical cases or deliver babies. The three stikes law should also apply to lawyers to be fair. Three mistakes and they are automatically disbarred.
Paul
|2008-11-15 01:29:40
That sounds as if it is the doctors fault that the tort systems are being abused in many judicial "hellholes".
I think you should tell us why the experience with Texas tort reform should not be reduplicated all over the county.
Only excessive punative damages are being caped.
There are no new class A Antibiotics being developed by the drug companies because recent class action lawsuits by the trial lawyers has has made the cost of liability insurance prohibitive. . The result is the the new resistant Bacteria will most likeley kill millions.
Robert Oshel
- Don't shift costs to injured patients; restrict p
|2008-11-14 09:53:33
A major impact of malpractice tort reform has been to shift the costs of malpractice from physicians and their insurers to injured patients. Children and retirees, who do not have lost wages, are unlikely to be able to even bring malpractice suits because they have little "economic" value.
A much better approach, which would lower malpractice insurance costs but also protect the public, would be for state medical boards to carefully review the records of physicians with multiple malpractice payments and revoke or restrict their licenses as appropriate.
Analysis of publicly available data from the National Practitioner Data Bank shows that the majority of all malpractice dollars paid out are paid out for only the very small percentage of physicians with multiple payments. Yet the data also shows that it is common for the few physicians with 5 or 10 or more malpractice payments to have had no action taken against them by a state licensing board. If the substandard physicians with a record of repeated malpractice were restricted or had their licenses revoked, the public would be safer and malpractice costs would go down without shifting those costs to injured patients.
Malpractice tort reform is treating the symptoms, not the disease. By the way, I am not an attorney or a malpractice victim. I am a Ph.D. researcher recently retired from the National Practitioner Data Bank, which receives reports of all malpractice payments, including otherwise confidential settlements, and reports of all state licensing board actions.
Paul
- Great article
|2008-11-12 14:17:42
wow! There is 589 Billion Dollars of excess trial lawyer costs putting it on the backs of health users and consumers!
We have got to get the message out!!!
Thank you for this great information.
Disclaimer:The medical information provided in this site is for educational purposes only. It is not intended nor implied to be a substitute for professional medical advice. Always consult your physician or healthcare provider prior to starting any new treatment or with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition.
