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Mark....are you a tort lawyer. If not, why are you so aggresively defending a crooked system. A system that continues to reward lawyers an astronomical one-third of the settlement.
Finally, I would ask those who favor restrictions on the legal system: Are you comfortable letting the medical profession regulate itself? That, in essence, is what those who would cripple or demolish the tort system are suggesting. My family contains a number of physicians, nurses, and health care workers. They know well the limitations of processes like "peer review". They know what terms like "conspiracy of silence" means. The fox should never be left guarding the hen house.
Yes, I do think the medical profession should regulate itself --- because doctors went to medical school and residency training and ONLY they know best how to take care of patients --- NOT stupid lawyers (who are mostly history and philosophy majors in college and can barely pass a 9th grade algebra test).
My Dad was an ER physician for 35 years and he was taught the old-school way --- which is take a very good history and physical and that will nail down a diagnosis 95% of the time.
However, ever since parasite lawyers started with these multi-million dollar lawsuits for every stupid malpractice case, my Dad was forced to order $1,500 CAT scans of the head for any patient who complained of a headache when 99% of the time -- IT WAS ONLY A TENSION HEADACHE -- and then he prescribed 2 aspirin and told them to get a good night's rest and see their family doctor if it was a complicated migraine. However, because of all the stinking lawyers, my Dad was forced to practice REALLY EXPENSIVE medical care for fear of that 1 in a 1000 case of somebody having a brain bleed that could kill them.
Let's not forget it was the STINKIN' LAWYERS in Congress that passed laws saying everyone must be seen in the emergency room regardless of ability to pay. That resulted in over 25 million people a year using the ER as their primary care doctor --- which is 15-20 times MORE EXPENSIVE per visit than seeing a family doctor since at least 50% of ER visits are NON-EMERGENCIES.
So please try to get educated about how our BLOATED and EXPENSIVE American healthcare scam is all because of lack of tort reform and letting GREEDY, PARASITE LAWYERS game the system !!!
Yes, I do think the medical profession should regulate itself --- because doctors went to medical school and residency training and ONLY they know best how to take care of patients --- NOT stupid lawyers (who are mostly history and philosophy majors in college and can barely pass a 9th grade algebra test).
My Dad was an ER physician for 35 years and he was taught the old-school way --- which is take a very good history and physical and that will nail down a diagnosis 95% of the time.
However, ever since parasite lawyers started with these multi-million dollar lawsuits for every stupid malpractice case, my Dad was forced to order $1,500 CAT scans of the head for any patient who complained of a headache when 99% of the time -- IT WAS ONLY A TENSION HEADACHE -- and then he prescribed 2 aspirin and told them to get a good night's rest and see their family doctor if it was a complicated migraine. However, because of all the stinking lawyers, my Dad was forced to practice REALLY EXPENSIVE medical care for fear of that 1 in a 1000 case of somebody having a brain bleed that could kill them.
Let's not forget it was the STINKIN' LAWYERS that passed laws saying everyone must be seen in the emergency room regardless of ability to pay. That resulted in over 25 million people a year using the ER as their primary care doctor --- which is 10-15 times MORE EXPENSIVE per visit than seeing a family doctor since at least 50% of ER visits are NON-EMERGENCIES.
So please try to get educated about how our BLOATED and EXPENSIVE American healthcare system is all because of lack of tort reform and letting GREEDY, PARASITE LAWYERS game the system !!!
Sometimes a statement is so ridiculous on its face it deserves and should get no rebuttal.
MyrKat, obviously the surgeons involved with removing the healthy kidney make a mistake. Look such a patient in the eye and tell him or her that he or she should trust the docs who butchered him to come up with an appropriate restitution.
Lawyer exist because little people got squashed like bugs - by judges, by aristocrats, by physicians.
People don't realize what it takes to even bring a medical malpractice suit to trial. Many times the patient and their family have to pony up thousands of dollars to the lawyers in good faith just to prove they are serious and not going to fink out when the going gets tough. Depositions can get grueling and many times the most personal information which we share only with our medical professionals and has nothing to do with the case are brought up and can be brought up in trial. For example if a woman asks her doctor to test for STDs cause she thinks her husband has cheated and she later has the wrong leg amputated this comes out in deposition. The husband is also suing for loss of companionship and consortium ( sex) and a jury is likely to hold this against BOTH of them.
And for every medical malpractice case which ends up in financial judgment for the plaintiff there are dozens if not hundreds which never get a cent. This means the lawyers are out all the time and money they have spent doing research, flying in and paying expert witnesses and other experts, nurses who review all records, etc.
Even if the plaintiff pays money up front in good faith the lawyers are paid only if they win the case which is not always a shoe in. Believe me doctors are loathe to testify against their peers. They won't even recommend they lose their licenses even if they know what horrors they have done. Even if they have treated the poor butchered patients in an attempt to reverse some damage.
For the most part medical malpractice lawyers earn their fees. Sure there are some greedy lawyers just like there are some sinful preachers (who are also incredibly greedy). But there are plenty of crappy doctors out there who should be brought up on criminal charges as well as civil ones.
If you have ever been "treated" by one of those crappy doctors and had to live the rest of your life in pain and knowing your life has been cut short you would be singing a different tune.
You know, I get really tired of people who keep asserting the reason that American health care is so expensive is because of medical malpractice claims. None of you ever cite any data to prove your point. You just give this opinion and I guess everyone is supposed to accept is as gospel truth.
Here are some real facts about this issue:
1. In 1975, California enacted "MICRA" or the Medical Insurance Compensation Reform Act. MICRA gives the medical profession virtually every "reform" (I prefer the term deform) that it could want in these cases. Non-economic damage awards are capped at $250,000. Legal fees in these cases are capped. The medical community is allowed to pay out damage awards in periodic payments, rather than in a lump sum. I could go on and on.
Here's the point though: If the medical community got every reform it wanted and if medical costs are so closely linked to malpractice lawsuits, than California should have some of the lowest medical costs in this country, right? Well the answer, of course, is that it doesn't. California has the 12th highest medical costs per capita of the 50 states. They would probably be even higher except for the facts that CA has a comparatively young population due to a lot of immigration (legal and illegal) and the fact that Californians are more into exercise and fitness than many people in other states are.
2. The government has studied the affect of medical malpractice suits on medical costs in general. The Congressional Budget Office has concluded that the malpractice suits result in a total increase of somewhere between 1% and 2% of health care expenditures. This research takes into account both the costs of medical malpractice insurance and the alleged cost of practicing defensive medicine by medical practitioners. Considering that medical costs rise an average of 3% to 7% per year, the point is that if you totally eliminated malpractice lawsuits, you wouldn't be able to notice the change in health care costs.
Finally, I would ask those who favor restrictions on the legal system: Are you comfortable letting the medical profession regulate itself? That, in essence, is what those who would cripple or demolish the tort system are suggesting. My family contains a number of physicians, nurses, and health care workers. They know well the limitations of processes like "peer review". They know what terms like "conspiracy of silence" means. The fox should never be left guarding the hen house.
You are probably underestimating the effect of defensive medicine. It is not "alleged," It's very real, and it may account for about a third of medical costs.
"Concerns and perceptions about medical liability lead practitioners to practice defensive medicine. As a result, diagnostic testing, consultations and imaging studies are ordered to satisfy a perceived legal risk, resulting in higher healthcare expenditures. To minimize malpractice risk, some neurosurgeons have eliminated high-risk procedures. Left unchecked, concerns over medical liability will further defensive medicine practices, limit patient access to care, and increase the cost of healthcare delivery in the United States."
In other words, not only does fear of being sued lead to unnecessary tests, it means some doctors will decline to do procedures that may have a significant risk of poor outcome. That is evident in obstetrics, too, for example, where some doctors and hospitals do not offer a trial of labor after a previous Cesarean section.
I really do not think there is much of a "conspiracy of silence" any more. With physicians having to compete with one another, peer review has become a way for some doctors to eliminate competition. They can be ruthless. Who regulates lawyers, by the way?
I have a real problem with attorneys making millions from a single malpractice case, too. The excuse that that money helps to pay for cases where the plaintiff loses does not fly with me. Lawyers do not take on contingency many cases they do not have an expectation of winning. If a jury awards $3 million for non-economic damages, why should a lawyer get $1 million or more out of that? What is the problem with payouts in the form of an annuity rather than a lump sum? Not everyone who receives a large sum of money at one time will be able to manage it. Money to pay for ongoing medical care should be available when it's needed and should stop when it's no longer needed.
I believe in another thread that you said the vaccine injury compensation system was a reasonable way to keep vaccines available to all of us. That has a cap on non-economic damages. It awards "reasonable" attorney fees. Lawyers do not make millions on vaccine court cases, though. Do we need such a system for neurosurgery? Obstetrics?
We also have the situation where juries award wildly different amounts for the same injury. In another post, you mentioned some of the factors that sway a jury, including the appearance of the parties in the suit and awards made on a basis of sympathy rather than merit. Do you really think that is just?
Sometimes a statement is so ridiculous on its face it deserves and should get no rebuttal.
Despite the hyperbole and capital letters, MyrKat7 is right, though. Go to an ER with a headache and it is highly unlikely you will leave without some type of imaging being performed. If the ER doc misses something that could have been diagnosed with a scan and he did not do one, he will get sued, even if there was no clear medical indication to do it.
Someone from that medical team (if not the surgeon himself/herself) should donate one of their healthy kidneys to this man, plus a few million. That sounds about right to me.
MyrKat, obviously the surgeons involved with removing the healthy kidney make a mistake. Look such a patient in the eye and tell him or her that he or she should trust the docs who butchered him to come up with an appropriate restitution.
Lawyer exist because little people got squashed like bugs - by judges, by aristocrats, by physicians.
YOU ARE MISSING MY POINT.
Of course there will always be a few doctors who screw up big time. Chalk it up to just plain ignorance or not focusing on their work. Happens in every profession, but with doctoring somebody could end up dead. Just remember that doctors are human like anyone else, and humans make mistakes. That bumbling IDIOT George W. Bush made a mistake about WMD's in Iraq and it cost the lives of over 5,000 American soldiers and over 1 million Iraqi civilians got butchered --- why aren't a crack team of parasite lawyers suing the Idiot Dubya for millions of dollars over HIS mistake ?!?!
What my post was hammering home into many of your thick skulls is that doctors are FORCED to practice VERY $$$$$ medicine because of the grossly disproportionate number of lawsuits and jury awards compared to other developed countries. You simply don't see the sickening level of profiteering from frivolous malpractice lawsuits in any other country like you do in the USA.
If you walk into a doctor's office and complain about a headache, a good doctor will diagnosis "headache", charge you $10 for the visit, and prescribe $3 worth of aspirin and tell you to go take a nap and relieve some stress. Once lawyers got involved, now a doctor has to order $2,500 worth of USELESS labs and imaging to tell you "swallow aspirin and go take a nap". Your ER bill will probably be around $5,000 total compared to the $40 visit at the PCP office.
Now do you nimrods understand why our healthcare system is being gamed by the parasite lawyers?
In Texas the limit is $250,000. That's right, no matter how gravely you are harmed, the government of Texas has decided that no damages can possibly be worth more than $250,000. They refer to that as "small government" and "freedom".
I call it letting incompetents get away with murder.
One more addition to my list of why I will never willingly step foot in Texas.
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