More data piles in refuting the bald claims of ATLA and “consumer” advocates that medical malpractice reform is somehow an insurance company conspiracy that doesn’t reduce rates. (See Mar. 22 and Jul. 29, 2003). In an actuarial study using the National Practitioner Data Bank, we find, among other interesting things, that (1) dollars paid in malpractice claims went up 80% between 1992 and 2001, even though the number of claims only went up less than 20% in the same period; and (2) malpractice premiums are higher in states without noneconomic damages caps compared to those in states with noneconomic damages caps. (Richard S. Blondi and Arthur Gurevitch, “Noneconomic Damage Caps Help Reduce Malpractice Insurance Premiums”, Contingencies, Nov.-Dec. 2003). Contingencies is the journal of the American Academy of Actuaries.
Posts Tagged ‘medical’
Does tort reform affect insurance rates?
In my radio interview last week, I was asked about the Wisconsin Association of Trial Lawyers’ claim that tort reform measures have no effect on medical insurance rates. ATLA’s “fact sheet” on medical malpractice reform makes the same claim. A 2003 HHS compilation of studies on the matter, linked on our old medical page, refutes that proposition. (HHS, “Confronting the New Health Care Crisis”, Mar. 3, 2003 at Tables 6 and 7).
Prosecuting the innocent, without consequences
Yesterday’s (Sunday’s) New York Post ran my review of Dorothy Rabinowitz’s just-out-in-softcover No Greater Tyrannies, about abuse-hysteria prosecutions. An excerpt: “In 1696, four years after the Salem executions, the Massachusetts colony held a day of contrition and collective soul-searching. Today, the persecutors seldom apologize; instead they tend to rise upward. Scott Harshbarger, D.A. in the Amirault case, went on to become attorney general of his state and now heads Common Cause, in which capacity he lectures the rest of us on ethics and good government.” (Walter Olson, “Salem Is Still With Us”, New York Post, Mar. 21). The New York Times reports that wrongful convictions, even when serious prosecutorial error or misconduct is involved and even when the accused was evidently innocent, seldom result in any career consequences for local prosecutors (Andrea Elliott and Benjamin Weiser, “When Prosecutors Err, Others Pay the Price”, New York Times, Mar. 21). And the Wall Street Journal has reprinted Ms. Rabinowitz’s column about the amazing ordeal gastroenterologist Patrick Griffin went through on charges of sexually abusing a patient, which culminated in his eventual acquittal on retrial — though by that point his medical license had been yanked and his practice was in ruins (“The Doctor’s Story”, Wall Street Journal, May 24, 2000). (via GruntDoc) (see also Jan. 8, Sept. 1)
On Pa. court sleaze, a kind of hush
Profile of a maverick attorney who after decades of fighting machine corruption and courthouse politics in Pennsylvania is now working for malpractice reform in the state: “[Bob] Surrick is upset about the silencing of the print media because of the fear of libel suits. He said that during the 18 years that Gene Roberts was the Philadelphia Inquirer’s executive editor, the newspaper won 17 Pulitzers, which was unheard of for a newspaper. But during the 1980s (while Roberts was still editor) Surrick said that the judges and justices started the business of suing their critics, particularly the print media critics, for libel, effectively silencing the Inquirer; after Roberts left, the newspaper no longer did investigative reporting on the judiciary. ‘If the media — the guardian of the truth about what is going on in government — does not tell you, who is going to tell you?’ Surrick asks.” (Eileen Laskas, “Whatever Happened to Bob Surrick?”, CountyPressOnline (Phila. suburbs), Jan. 28) (via Donna Rovito’s Liability Update Information Network). For more on the kinds of legal trouble you can get into by criticizing Pennsylvania judges, see Oct. 24-25, 2001.
N.Y. midwives, cont’d
Abrupt demise of doc-suers database
Targeted by trial lawyer allies in a short but effective media campaign, the website DoctorsKnow.Us (see Mar. 9) has now closed up shop, leaving the following message: “DoctorsKnow.Us has permanently ceased operations as of 3/9/04. The controversy this site has ignited was unanticipated and has polarized opinions regarding the medical malpractice crisis. Our hope is that this controversy will spark a serious discussion that results in changes that are equitable to both patients and physicians. All charges that have been collected will be returned to members and trial members.” It was probably just a matter of time until their antagonists figured out a way of suing them, anyway. More: notwithstanding claims by Texas Watch’s Dan Lambe that doctors violate ethical rules if they decline to accept potentially litigious patients, the Wall Street Journal reports: “Doctors are required by their ethics codes to treat patients in emergency situations. When there is no emergency, however, physicians generally can choose whether or not to see a patient.” (Rachel Emma Silverman, “Site on Litigious Patients Shuts”, WSJ, Mar. 11, sub$; MedRants, Mar. 6, Mar. 7). Ironically (or maybe not), Lambe’s group, which orchestrated the press brouhaha and which professes to be scandalized that plaintiffs would be included in a database without any showing that their suits were faulty, has itself campaigned for the state to make public a database of complaints against doctors themselves, even though many of those complaints prove unfounded (Andis Robeznieks, “States eye tougher stance on doctor discipline, competency testing”, American Medical News (AMA), Mar. 3, 2003)(includes quote from Texas Medical Association official calling Texas Watch “a front funded by the trial lawyers” whose “purpose is to fan the flames”). For more on the role of Texas Watch in the state’s malpractice politics, see Texans for Lawsuit Reform press release, Sept. 4, 2003. Yet more: Bard Parker (Cut to Cure) has some reflections about what the press regards as hot news as regards the withdrawal of physician services, and what it does not (Mar. 15)(& letter to the editor, Apr. 2).
Malpractice plaintiff database
By reader acclaim: trial lawyer allies are crying “blacklist” about a fledgling service, DoctorsKnow.us, which makes available to paying subscribers the names of patients who have filed suits against doctors in the past, along with their lawyers and expert witnesses. “You may use the service to assess the risk of offering your services to clients or potential clients,” the Web site says. The site’s slogan is: “They can sue, but they can’t hide.” (Ralph Blumenthal, “In Texas, Hire a Lawyer, Forget About a Doctor?”, New York Times, Mar. 5)(Slashdot thread) Sydney Smith, MedRants and Cut to Cure all comment. The site DoctorsKnow.us is blank as of Monday evening, and, no, we don’t know why. Update: site is back up, with what looks like changes meant to answer/acknowledge criticism. Older version here. Plus: Chris Rangel (RangelMD) turns a definite thumbs down.
Stop treating nursing home patients, or lose your insurance
In Ohio, doctors treating the elderly are being given an “ultimatum: Stop seeing nursing home patients or get no insurance at all. … Frank O’Neil, vice president of corporate communications for malpractice insurer ProAssurance, said the company has made it a policy to stop insuring doctors whose main business is nursing home care. The lawsuit climate in nursing homes, O’Neil said, is worse than any other area of malpractice law, ‘bar none.'” (Tracy Wheeler, “Insurers push doctors to drop older patients”, Akron Beacon Journal, Feb. 15) (via MedPundit, who also covers the Ohio malpractice crisis in posts dated Feb. 14 and Feb. 17). See also Tracy Wheeler, “State seeks solutions to rising insurance costs”, Akron Beacon Journal, Feb. 15. For more on nursing home litigation, see Dec. 17 and links from there.
Fla. docs petition to curb malpractice fees
Citizens for a Fair Share, a group backed by the Florida Medical Association, is seeking to put a state constitutional amendment on the ballot in the Sunshine State to limit attorneys’ fees in medical malpractice cases; it’ll need to collect 450,000 verified signatures (Donna Wright, “Doctors petition for tighter cap on fees”, Bradenton Herald, Nov. 4; Gary Fineout, “A Crisis Or Battle Of Special Interests”, Lakeland Ledger, Nov. 24; Patrick Danner, “Lawyers’ fees come under fire”, Miami Herald, Jan. 4; “Sunshine, Ballots and Lawyers”, Center for Individual Freedom, Feb. 12). But Associated Industries of Florida, the state’s leading business group, is opposing the measure (Diane Hirth, “Lobby groups disagree on drive”, Tallahassee Democrat, Jan. 31)(FMA statement).
As for the state’s trial lawyers, they have already prepared revenge initiatives against the doctors. A group calling itself Floridians for Patient Protection, a political action committee of the Academy of Florida Trial Attorneys, is collecting signatures for three constitutional amendment proposals of its own. One of its proposals “would require physicians to charge the same fee for the same service to all patients.” (Liz Freeman, “Supporters of cap on attorney fees collect enough signatures for review”, Naples Daily News, Feb. 11). The executive director of the Academy of Florida Trial Lawyers describes the initiatives as “countermeasures to ensure that the FMA must play defense first and offense second” (Scott Carruthers, “Pressing Forward”, Jan. 1, likely to rotate off URL). (Update Jul. 20: both doctors’ and lawyers’ measures qualify for ballot.) The revenge-initiative technique has served the litigation lobby well in California ballot battles. After insurance companies were so rash as to support efforts to obtain liability reform through the initiative process, trial lawyers struck back in 1988 with the rate-slashing Proposition 103, which inflicted huge losses on the industry. And when high-tech execs stepped to the plate with a batch of initiatives aimed at curbing litigation, the trial lawyers’ riposte was a counter-initiative that would have put the executives’ personal homes and assets at risk in a much broader range of securities cases. Both groups got the message, and abandoned the California initiative game.
Stuart Taylor, Jr. on Sen. Edwards
He reviews Edwards’s autobiography, Four Trials, which “provides a window into the faux-populist pretenses and other flaws of the system that made this millworker’s son into a multimillionaire.” Aside from Edwards’s cerebral palsy wins, much discussed in this space, there was the punitive damages award he obtained after a truck crash, against the trucking company for having paid its drivers by the mile: the justice of this $4 million award is open to much question as a matter of blame-fixing, aside from which it “ultimately came out of the pockets of the same ordinary, hardworking Americans whose champion he purports to be — and a big chunk of it went into the pockets of John Edwards. … Edwards’s business-bashing, anti-free-trade, us-against-them campaign rhetoric, unlike John Kerry’s, seems sincere. Edwards sounds as if he believes in his bones that behind every misfortune there must be a wealthy villain.” (Stuart Taylor, Jr., “John Edwards: The Lawsuit Industry Puts Its Best Face Forward”, National Journal/The Atlantic, Feb. 25).
Steve Bainbridge, noting Edwards’s jobs-jobs-jobs economic rhetoric, wonders whether the Senator pauses to worry about certain jobs destroyed by some of his main backers (Feb. 25). Edwards’s latest fund-raiser in Houston was hosted by John O’Quinn, who as the impresario of the breast implant litigation that bankrupted Dow Corning knows a thing or two about destroying jobs (Rachel Graves, “Fund-raisers bring Edwards to town”, Houston Chronicle, Feb. 24; Ken Herman, “The 2004 Election”, Cox/Palm Beach Post, Feb. 25). And on the Edwards-and-cerebral-palsy controversy that we and several other webloggers were pursuing earlier this month, Franco Castalone (The LitiGator) has added a pair of posts clarifying and extending his earlier comments, the first of which (Feb. 15) relays a wealth of information about no-fault birth injury compensation programs and the litigation they would replace, and the second of which (Feb. 16) makes some valuable points about civility in disagreement, and also says generous things about this site.