"Hire a lawyer, forget about a doctor?"

[Marge]

Fascinating story in the New York Times about a "medical malpractice black list" maintained by doctors in Texas -- a database of people who are supposedly prone to "litigious behavior" vis-a-vis doctors.

If you ever sued a doctor, no matter how justified you were, you apparently risk getting on this list, and you may have trouble ever getting a doctor for yourself or a family member. For instance: one guy who sued a Fort Worth hospital after his wife died (they missed her brain tumor and he got an undisclosed amount in settlement) had trouble finding a doctor who would treat his son after he landed on the database. Another couple went on the list after they sued when the husband went in for a herniated disk repair, nearly bled to death on the operating table, and suffered serious brain damage. It turned out his surgeon << was addicted to painkillers, had once left a surgical sponge inside a patient, and on other occasions operated on the wrong hip and amputated the wrong leg. >> [And the guy is apparently still practicing. You would think doctors would WANT to get rid of doctors like that, not take it out on the victims.]

I know doctors are legitimately concerned about the costs of medical practice lawsuits, but this seems like it's going a bit too far.

The story is at http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/05/national/05DOCT.html

 

[Ross]

It's just like everything else. A few have ruined it for many. There are far too many frivilous lawsuits being opened. Don't get me wrong, if you've been royally screwed by a Dcotor, you have my blessing to sue him, but this crap of suing just to sue and get money has to stop. Again the Government has looked away far too long and allow this to continue. It's affecting everyone, Doctors, Patients, Courts etc, the only winners here are the insurance companies.

All of this type of crap has caused my area to lose some very good Doctors due to outrageous insurance premiums. I nearly lost the Doctor responsible for terminating my hospital acquired staph infection after my AVR. He has never been sued, but has been named repeatedly in reports of Doctors who have been. Does anyone else see something wrong with this picture?

 

[tommy]

I agree that lawsuits have gone too far. Too many incentives for people to increase the size of the cookie jar and then all get their hands in it.

Don't get me wrong, there is a real need for attorneys and most provide valuable service. But some unscrupulous lawyers and plaintiffs should be ashamed of themselves.

The damage to our culture is far reaching. Instant gratification without effort. Damaged reputations of worthy people. Loss of talent in the professional services - especially health services. Increased medical costs and testing so doctors can protect themselves. The general discouragement that it is out of control. Frivilous lawsuits have raised the price of every good and service we purchase.

But putting victims on a list goes way over the line. Yes there are some that repeatedly sue doctors - they belong on a list, or in jail, with their attorney.

I favor limits on punitive damages. This will reduce the huge incentives and should keep the lawsuits down to the real and justified complaints. If somebody has been wronged, let them recover what they need. Pain and suffering damages? Sure. But, I think its the punitive damages that spoil the process.

 

[Harpoon]

I think, unfortunantely, the lawyers are getting too good at finding just enough fault in the "borderline cases" to win suits... While I have no doubt that there are plenty (too many?) bad doctors out there, it seems to me that most of the cases that end up getting heard in a court now are over things that should be pretty much common sense issues, like suing because the coffee was too hot and burned your lap when you spilled it on yourself.


The system does need change. If you're guilty of malpractice, maybe it shouldn't be a civil action that determines guilt and punishment, maybe it should be a criminal suit. Doctors that do things like that, amputating the wrong limb or leaving surgical materials behind, shouldn't be sued, they should stand before a court and face, at the very least, revocation of their license to practice medicine.

You can sue me a thousand times over, but if I'm still doing botched plastic surgery, I'm still hurting people, still making money off of it too!


That's the problem. We're not stopping bad doctors, we're just making the insurance coverage for doctors all more expensive which in turn makes our medical expenses higher.


Personally, I'd like to see more criminal (or whatever) action taken. If a doctor screws up he shouldn't be allowed to continue practicing. Maybe a system could be put in place that allows "remedial education" and recertification. Like going to drunk driving school after you've had your license revoked. You can't drive for 6 months and you have to go to classes 3 times a week to learn about the mistakes you made and if in 6 months time you've completed the remediation with no additional offenses, you get your license back, but maybe with higher insurance rates.

The higher insurance rates for doctors who've screwed up in the past in turn signal potential patients that they might be at higher risk, so they go to another doctor which is safer AND cheaper, hence an added deterent to screwing up in the first place...


Maybe I should run for Congress....

 

[Raverlaw]

Here in California, we have caps on med-mal damages, which have helped get civil actions against medical professionals under control.

It isn't the case that are WON that drive up rates, etc., it is all the frivolous cases that are settled or even lost; because the cost of defending these far and away exceeds the amounts given in verdicts on legitimate cases. Caps help discourage the bogus cases.

A list isn't a bad idea; someone who shows up on the list more than once is probably overly litigious. Like anything else, however, the list can be mis-used or over-reacted to. Sounds like that's what happened in Marge's story.