Cost of Medical Malpractice Tops $55 Billion a Year in U.S.

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It's sad that the debate gets so overrun by people who know little to nothing, and yet spend all of their time preaching that the other side is wrong.
There needs to be med-mal reform. Like it or not, all of the fingers get pointed at Health Care providers and insurers. Very few people want to talk about the "system" as a whole (shudder); the conversation comes to a stand still. You will not have effective health care reform if you only reduce income/revenue of physicians and insurers. The current health care reforms are punitive in nature only; you gain nothing if you alienate those people who went into health care.
As a physician, I can tell you first hand that if I would have placed the energy that it took to make it through residency and medical school into a business I would surely be more financially well off. You have to genuinely love taking care of patients, otherwise the volume of work is not worth it. With that being said, there is a definite fear of litigation felt by physicians (due to the punative nature of the system) which poisons the clinic/ed/hospital setting and makes every patient interaction feel as if there is the potential for a suit. Because of this, you order testing/admissions to rule out every life threatening condition, even in low risk patients.
In Louisiana, there is a patient compensation fund. Regardless of caps, only 15% of dollars make it into the hands of patients. 85% gets tied up in the system. ~75% of physicians named in suits had no impact in the negative outcome (imagine you got named in a auto accident suit just because you were on the same street as the car which was hit...you'd be terribly nervous), and yet only ~3% of the cases where there is negligence does a case brought forth. On all accounts the system is flawed.
In the majority of cases the caps are only for the punitive charges and for non-economic damages. Economic damages and further medical care are usually not capped. These caps do serve an important purpose. The last thing we need for the system is a bunch of $30 million dollar cases. Due to massive cases (See John Edwards and his claim to fame), more unnecessary C-Sections are being performed for the unlikely event of a brachial plexus injury or Cerebal palsy. Likewise, due to fear of litany other defensive medicine occurs, and it occurs at rates greater that what is reported.
The blame is to be placed on the system by and large. There are bad eggs everywhere, but mostly there are people who try to do good, and within a good system they can.

Instapundit of LA 6:49PM September 17, 2010

Does disclosure of medical errors lead to more lawsuits? http://www.healthcaretownhall.com/?p=3012

Jeremy Engdahl-Johnson of WA 6:43PM September 08, 2010

If the government should not be allowed to put caps on lawsuits for malpractice, then should physicians be capped on what they can charge for life saving treatment? Physicians are in a unique position where they save lives as a profession, what is your life worth if you had to put a dollar value to it?

Mike of FL 1:13PM September 07, 2010

What a biased study. Many states now have caps and regulations on med mal cases that make it practically impossible and impractical to sue a doctor after they screw up. As someone that has been disabled and drastically impacted because of a doctor's mistake, I know first hand how the American Medical Association endorses such biased articles. Why cant med mal be treated like anything else, such as car accidents? If someone errs and injures someone, they should be held responsible for damages. That is what insurance is for. Doctors just dont want to have to pay the insurance, be held responsible because they think they are above everyone else, and dont want to be told they arent perfect. The fact that they now are spending billions of unneeded money in 'defensive medicine' is not only injuring patients worse with unneeded tests, meds, treatments but also is making the doctors and hospitals even more money and robbing they healthcare system. They really have a monopoly going and articles such as this only impact the problem imagine if a loved one of yours is injured or killed due to an error by their doctor and there was no recourse. If this concerns you, write a letter to your legislators and try to repeal this mad mal caps that only protect doctor, not you or your loved ones.

been there of ID 12:25PM September 07, 2010

Well considering these are the folks that control our ability to heal ourselves, it's not surprising folks are miffed when they don't do it right. Particularly when they charge unrealistic fees to practice on us. Make medicine more afordable rather than allowing the gov't to pick up the tab at current prices and at the publics expense.

Dick of WA 10:15AM September 07, 2010