New research by Michael Frakes of Cornell: “I estimate a small and statistically insignificant relationship between malpractice forces and two metrics of healthcare quality emphasized by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality: avoidable hospitalization rates (reflective of outpatient quality) and inpatient mortality rates for selected medical conditions.” [SSRN]
Posts Tagged ‘medical malpractice’
NYT vs. White Coat on undiagnosed sepsis case
On July 12 New York Times columnist Jim Dwyer wrote an extensive story about the death of a 12-year-old boy who had been brought to an emergency room with fever and rapid pulse, sent home, and died of septic shock. Lab test results and other indicators of distress allegedly went unheeded, and the boy’s family is represented by Thomas Moore, perhaps the city’s premier medical malpractice lawyer. Some legal blogs had a field day citing Dwyer’s article as an example of flagrant medical malpractice, as they depicted it; other reactions, some gathered in a Dwyer follow-up column, were more mixed.
White Coat, the blog at Emergency Physicians Monthly, has been resistant to the Dwyer-Moore narrative of the case. Its blog posts can be found here,
here, here, and here.
Welcome New York Post readers
I’ve got a piece in today’s New York Post on why doctors and medical providers should be interested in New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation “early offers” experiment in malpractice reform. Earlier here, etc. Note also that Christopher Robinette at TortsProf has added to his illuminating series of posts on the idea with new contributions here and here (& Allen McDuffee, Washington Post “Think Tank”.)
N. H. med-mal: “early offers,” with a side of loser-pays
Overriding a veto from Gov. John Lynch, the New Hampshire legislature on June 27 enacted SB 406, establishing the nation’s first “early offer” system for medical malpractice claims. The law establishes incentives for defendants to make offers early in the litigation process that cover plaintiff’s economic losses such as medical bills and lost wages. The early-offer process is at claimants’ option only; claimants are free not to request such an offer. [Kevin Pho; supportive website; trial lawyers’ opposition website]
Importantly, the new procedure also contains pioneering elements of loser-pays in both directions. If a claimant chooses to accept a defendant’s early offer of economic-loss expenses, the defendant will pay an additional sum to reflect a scheduled assessment of pain and suffering, plus the reasonable costs of attorney representation. However, if the claimant invokes the early-offer process but then turns down the offer as inadequate, there is a real risk of a fee shift in the opposite direction:
XII. A claimant who rejects an early offer and who does not prevail in an action for medical injury against the medical care provider by being awarded at least 125 percent of the early offer amount, shall be responsible for paying the medical care provider’s reasonable attorney’s fees and costs incurred in the proceedings under this chapter. The claimant shall certify to the court that bond or other suitable security for payment of the medical care provider’s reasonable attorney’s fees and costs has been posted before the court shall consider the case.
At TortsProf, Christopher Robinette explains in some detail (contrary to an error-filled screed in a Litigation Lobby outlet) why this adds up to a generally good deal for claimants (who, of course, are free not to trigger the process if they disagree) as well as making the system fairer. “Early-offer” proposals have been championed over the years by Jeffrey O’Connell, the distinguished University of Virginia torts scholar, and by Philip K. Howard of Common Good, among others. More on loser-pays here.
[Research assistance: Cato Institute intern Byron Crowe; cross-posted at Cato at Liberty]
More from John Steele Gordon at Commentary: “This looks like a big step in the right direction.”
By reader acclaim: cardiologist should have warned cop of sex spree
Covered it in a roundup a couple of weeks back, but as a reader favorite it may as well have its own post: “A jury has awarded a Georgia woman $3 million over her husband’s heart attack, finding that his doctor should have warned the Atlanta cop against strenuous activity like the three-way sex he was having at the time he died, WXIA-TV reports.” The deceased was not married to either of the other participants in the fatal motel-room encounter. [USA Today/Freep]
June 1 roundup
- Most embarrassing lawsuit Hall of Fame (plaintiff’s decedent division) [Atlanta Journal-Constitution, cardiology med-mal; more]
- Latest twist in ongoing speech-chilling saga worthy of attention from PEN: attorney Aaron Walker is charged in Rockville, Md. after a court interprets his blogging about an adversary as a violation of a peace order [Hans Bader and more, Eugene Volokh, Scott Greenfield with comments from Maryland lawyer Bruce Godfrey, Patterico, Popehat, and many others; earlier here, here, and here.] And Ken at Popehat, in a perhaps not unrelated development, puts out a call for a pro bono criminal lawyer to protect a blogger in M.D. Fla. and M.D. Tenn.
- California lament: Facebook must pay hefty bribe to be allowed to hire more employees [Coyote]
- “The burdens of e-discovery” [Ted Frank/PoL]
- Strangest judicial campaign video of the year? [Jim Foley, candidate for Washington Court of Appeals, Olympia; Above the Law, followup]
- Massive wave of disability claims among returning vets [AP]
- We keep loading up company compliance/ethics folk with new regulatory responsibilities. How’s that working out? [Compliance Week]
Medical roundup
- Government’s hospital care guidelines may be fueling dangerous overuse of antibiotics [White Coat] FDA says fewer drugs are in shortage [Reuters, earlier here, etc.]
- “Post-tort-reform Texas doctor supply” [Ted Frank/PoL and commenters] “Change in Procedures Lets Medical Malpractice [Insurance] Industry Thrive” [PC 360]
- Forcing companies to make politicized disclosures to customers implicates First Amendment [Hans Bader on HHS “must credit ObamaCare” reg]
- Iqbal and Twombly SCOTUS decisions on pleading have helped protect pharmaceutical defendants from flimsily based suits [James Beck, who has changed law firms to Reed Smith]
- How accurate is hospital data coding? Ask thousands of pregnant British men [Nigel Hawkes via Flowing Data]
- Class-action-fed boom in Medicaid dentistry + “let’s put docs in schools” idea = scope for horrific abuse, no matter how it’s financed [Bloomberg via Jesse Walker]
- Suits blaming obstetricians for cerebral palsy rack up $78 million win in Philadelphia, $74 million in California [Legal Intelligencer, Cal Coast News]
- Ninth Circuit: on reflection, let’s not seize control of VA mental health programs [AP, earlier here, etc.]
House passes med-mal limits
Clarifying Florida lawyers’ position
According to what seems to be the sense of many in the Florida legal profession, doctors and their patients should not have the right to enter enforceable arbitration agreements before the fact to resolve disputes, but lawyers and their clients should have the right to enter enforceable agreements before the fact to limit liability for excessive charging of legal fees. Thanks for clarifying! [White Coat, scroll; earlier]
February 14 roundup
- “Brazil Sues Twitter in Bid to Ban Speed Trap and Roadblock Warnings” [ABA Journal]
- Obama nominates Michigan trial lawyer Marietta Robinson to vacancy on Consumer Product Safety Commission, ensuring aggressively pro-regulatory majority [Bluey, Heritage]
- “AMA reports show high cost of malpractice suits” [HCFN] “Average expense to defend against a medical liability claim in 2010 was $47,158” [American Medical News, more] Survey of 1,200 orthopedic surgeons finds defensive medicine rife, at cost of billions, accounting for 7 percent of all hospital admissions [MedPageToday]
- “Sue us only in Delaware” bylaws would kill off forum-shopping and what fun is that? [Bainbridge, Reuters]
- Trial by media: Lefty “SourceWatch” posts, then deletes, docs from Madison County pesticide suit [Madison County Record]
- Think you’ve beaten FCPA rap? Meet the obscure “Travel Act” [Mike Emmick, Reuters] Federal court expands “honest services fraud” in lobbying case [Paul Enzinna, Point of Law]
- “On the horrors of getting approval for an ice-cream parlour in San Francisco” [NYT via Doctorow/BoingBoing]