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  1. In Memory of LAJ_FETT: Please share your remembrances and condolences HERE

2003 State of the Union Reaction and Discussion Thread.

Discussion in 'Archive: The Senate Floor' started by Darth Mischievous, Jan 28, 2003.

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  1. Herman Snerd

    Herman Snerd Jedi Master star 6

    Registered:
    Oct 31, 1999
    The top 1% pay that much because they MAKE that much. They aren't being taxed any more or any less, proportionally, than the poor (unless you count tax relief).

    When considering just the federal income tax, the rich are taxed proportionally more than the poor. Depending on where the definition of "poor" falls on the income scale (and including such random factors as numbers of dependants, deductions, etc.), many of those with the lowest incomes don't actually pay any federal income tax, and with such programs like the earned income tax credit receive "refunds" on taxes that they don't pay.


    However, when all taxation is factored in, the poor do take a disproportionate hit merely because of the level playing field. Specifically the sales tax is the chief cause of this due to the fact that it's based on expeditures, not income. It's impossible to survive without such essentials as food, clothing, and shelter, so there is no getting around the sales tax.
     
  2. JediTre11

    JediTre11 Jedi Padawan star 4

    Registered:
    Mar 25, 2001
    Taxes, taxes, taxes... I remember being a kid and watching Robin Hood. Prince John had all those gold coins, but no princess. I also remember how ridiculus it seemed to find so much joy in money. Taxes today are much the same as in the movie. Tax the people, and they will hate you. Lower the taxes and they will love you.

    All this talk and I wonder who really supports taxing the borgeoisie and the proletariat before the upper class? So the people who have money don't get as much, better put off buying that Ferrari.

    Politicians utter the words "tax cuts" and they've just bought votes. Money translates to votes in America. I was roughly $400 per household that helped Bush into office. I paid my friend $20 to vote for Nader. He said "who?" Give people enough money and they won't care who they vote for. Taxes in this speech were not about jump starting the economy, they were for four more years in office. Anyone that doesn't at least acknowledge this is seriously near-sighted.

    Taxes, taxes, taxes? Revolution, revolution, revolution... Please, tax us some more.
     
  3. Vaderize03

    Vaderize03 Manager Emeritus star 6 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Oct 25, 1999
    Is your health and well-being worth only $250,000? How about your life? 98,000 people die each year at the hands of their doctors.

    PPOR. With the alarming rise in frivolous lawsuits, more and more doctors are being dropped by their insurance companies, having their liscenses revoked, or being so smeared by lawyers that they are literally run out of town.

    Is your health and well-being worth hundreds of millions of dollars? Because that's what's being awarded in philadelphia-for trivial and minor things. Suing because of malpractice is one thing (and completely fair), but suing because of a bad outcome for which the risk was acknowledged before said treatment is wrong.

    Some facts for you:

    a) 80% of all medical malpractice lawsuits filed against physicians in the past ten years, with the trend continuing this past year, were dismissed or won by the doctors. That leaves 20% where not only juries, but judges, agreed that some form of medical malfeasance had taken place. Judges are perfectly capable of throwing out verdicts they feel are based on wrongful evidence or prejudicial decision-making. They are also empowered to reduce out-of-control verdicts for pain-and-suffering, such as $100 million +. I'm not talking about punitive damages, which may need to run into the tens of millions (or more), "sympathy money"-often with a lions share going to attorney's fees.

    b) Physicians who see medicare patients or HMO patients are forbidden from passing the cost of malpractice insurance on to their patients. If you own a store, and your distributor marks up the cost of wholesale 10%, what do you do? You pass on the cost to the consumer, or you go under. Most sick patients in the US are older, and on medicare. The majority of younger americans are in HMOs. I smell a rat, myself.

    Guess what? Doctors have a right to earn a living too-and they work very long hours (especially surgeons, anesthesiologists, ob/gyns), and in very stressful environments. It's hard enough to make decisions for someone's life and well-being; constant worrying over suits has been disastrous to the profession. Lawyers, of course, will defend their right to sue to the death, as well as continue to demand increased liability with decreased protection for the reporting of medical errors. Real lawsuits have merit, but frivolous ones are out of control.

    Many of these doctors are allowed to continue practicing medicine.

    How about some facts on the actual number of physicians whose liscenses' were revoked as a result of a gross negligence charge? If a doctor screws up this royally, then a criminal charge is warranted-not a billion dollars to the victim which then puts all the other doctors in the state out of business. This is happening in W. Va, in PA, in FL, in Mississippi. I fear that no-one will listen until major centers begin to close.

    The people who come accross these doctors and are physically maimed or killed by them have the right to collect damages.

    Agreed. But the current climate is the same one in which McDonald's was sued for making teenagers obese. Something needs to be done. Doctors will simply walk. You can't force them to practice medicine. At some point, a fair degree of power will have to swing back towards them and away from the lawyers. It's that simple. The current climate cannot continue. Decisions made by physicians are challenged by non-MDs: lawyers and insurers. This at least needs to stop. I could go on all night.

    Frivalous lawsuits aside, capping the amount of damages for REAL lawsuits does nothing but make it easier for bad doctors to stay in practice.

    If you think physicians are too blame for the malpractice crisis, you are sorely mistaken, and gravely naive. I mean that. In pennsylvania, lawyers have chosen to use outrageous jury awards as a lottery system, filing hundreds of lawsuits (512 filed on one day alone; more than the entire 2-year period from 1997-1999). These lawyers are taking 60% of awards-and by refusing to redu
     
  4. TripleB

    TripleB Jedi Padawan star 4

    Registered:
    Oct 28, 2000
    Excellent Post, Vaderize, I could not have done any better.

    Just keep in mind that Medical lawsuit reforms will not stop anyone from having their day in court. If you want to sue, you still can. You just won't be able to sue for as much, as the result will be that many a Trial Lawyer will look elswhere to squeeze money out of american business (ie, the McDonalds made me fat lawsuit)
     
  5. Darth Mischievous

    Darth Mischievous Jedi Grand Master star 6

    Registered:
    Oct 12, 1999
    I'm in agreement with V-03 on his above statements, including the tort lawyers and their frivolous lawsuits.

    Being a physician isn't what it used to be, as they aren't living as much of the high life as they used to before the cost-control HMO system. Many MD's I work with complain about this and tort lawyers all of the time.

    These lawyers really are the bane of the medical profession. I personally have much distain for their methods, and they are making our jobs much more difficult than they have to be.

    Certainly malpractice lawsuits in warranted situations are justified, however most are frivolous. Many of these people are looking for an excuse to get settlement money and the lawyer is getting rich off of the system.

    People forget that MD's and RN's are human. There is a difference between human error and gross negligence.
     
  6. KnightWriter

    KnightWriter Administrator Emeritus star 9 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Nov 6, 2001
    That was truly fascinating, Vaderize. I'm not sure on my stance yet (as I'm just now learning about the issue), but either way, it was a great piece of writing.
     
  7. Herman Snerd

    Herman Snerd Jedi Master star 6

    Registered:
    Oct 31, 1999
    Stories about doctors giving up their private practices and their patients are becoming more common.

    I recently heard a case where an OB/GYN in Nevada (I think) was closing her office because her malpractice insurance premiums were running in excess of $400,000 per year.


    EDIT: Here's something I just stumbled across on the net. It's a bit of a counterpoint to Vaderize03's post. Personally I find it to be a load of crap, but it might make for interesting discussion into this subject.

    The Link


    THE CURE FOR DOCTOR MALPRACTICE


    BY DAY, I am one of those terrible trial lawyers the local physicians have been blaming for the rising cost of malpractice coverage. So with my bias in plain view, I thought I'd offer my own diagnosis of their problem and offer a few home remedies.

    First the common ground. Yes, there is too much litigation in society. But the volume of cases filed against doctors is not the reason for their increased cost of coverage.

    The doctors' premiums are rising because of the amount of malpractice committed by doctors, the refusal of the medical community to police itself, and poorly managed insurance companies.

    Not too long ago, the Institute of Medicine, based upon a Harvard University study, demonstrated that approximately 100,000 deaths per year occur in this country due to medical error. Philadelphia, the home of many teaching hospitals, has more than its fair share. Those errors raise the cost of insurance in our area.

    So, too, does the actual consequence of physician errors. There are bad doctors just as there are lousy lawyers, teachers, accountants, and widget makers. The difference is that when a physician fails a patient by acting improperly, or failing to act, the outcome can be catastrophic. Juries assess the cost of caring for the injured when they determine the amount of malpractice verdicts. So as the cost of medical care rises, so does the amount of verdicts, as well as insurance rates. The remedy? Less malpractice would mean less costs for caring for injured patients, and lower.

    A second factor is the medical community's unwillingness to weed out bad actors. Consider that Pennsylvania physicians have primary insurance and excess coverage that is provided by something called the Medical CAT Fund. It's estimated that 40% of all CAT Fund pay-outs over the last 26 years have been made for just 2% of Pennsylvania's doctors.

    Common sense would dictate that if they would get rid of those physicians, it would bring down rates, but it gets worse. Not only does the medical community do nothing to police itself, but patients are left in the dark and can't get access to information about physicians' track records. There is indeed a code of silence in the medical community. The remedy? Identify the bad actors. Then the market will handle them appropriately.

    Poorly managed malpractice carriers are the third big factor. Recently, two of them were so poorly run that they went belly up and now a third is having difficulty. The malpractice primary insurance companies - and the CAT Fund in its role as excess carrier - routinely exercise bad business judgment. For example, they rarely cut their losses early in significant, clear liability malpractice cases. Instead, they waste tens of thousands of dollars defending cases that everyone knows will eventually settle on the court house steps. The remedy? Clear cases should settle sooner, and marginal cases should be tried to verdict rather than settled, to dissuade the filing of frivolous lawsuits.

    Too bad the doctors don't talk about these things. Instead they're working a twofold PR strategy: blame the trial lawyers and point fingers toward the City of Philadelphia.

    And why not. Everybody blames the trial lawyers, that is, until they need one.

    Listen to the physicians, and you will believe that every malpractice action filed in Philadelphia is a guaranteed winner for millions of dollars.
     
  8. chibiangi

    chibiangi Jedi Master star 4

    Registered:
    Jun 16, 2002
    I'm really, really, tired right now, so I'm only to respond to a few points...

    According to the National Academy of Sciences, approximately 98,000 Americans die from "medical mistakes" each year. Medical malpractice can result in serious personal injury and/or wrongful death. It is usually a result of negligence, in which the physician does not perform up to medical standards.

    I found that one on a few different websites. The range was between 45k+-98k.

    a) Cap the %-age the lawyers make over $1 million dollars in the pain-and-suffering damage section to 1% or less, thus removing major incentive for frivolous lawsuits.

    I have no problem with this. In fact, I think it's a great idea because it does not give an incentive to lawyers and allows patients to get JUST compensation.

    When a doctor screws up repeatedly, it's usually to be rather obvious.

    Does a doctor have to screw up repeatedly before they are removed from practice? That is scary to me.

    And people wonder why I hate going to the doctor? Sheesh, go in for implants and come out a double amputee.

    Since we are trained to be independent thinkers who don't do well in groups, we have little real political power, and thus are less able to defend ourselves when attacked.

    Uhm, suuuuure. The AMA is just a delicate flower of an organization ;)


    I am not saying that I disagree with the idea of reform. What I disagree with is the CAPPING of damages that can be received by the person who has been wrongfully mistreated.

    No-one's talking about capping punitive damages; this is about putting a halt to those who advertise on TV that they'll get you "millions" because of your "bad doctors". Sheister lawyers who convince patients that they have been wronged, and then bankrupt insurance companies and physicians so that they can get a huge payday and retire.

    In California, the cap is $250,000. I am against this wholeheartedly for the reasons I already specified.

    California places a cap on non-economic damages for medical malpractice cases. Cal. Civ. Code § 3333.2 (West 1997). Non-economic damages, defined as compensation for pain, suffering, inconvenience, physical impairment, disfigurement, and other non-pecuniary injury, are limited to $250,000. Id. The cap applies whether the case is for injury or death, and it allows only one $250,000 recovery in a wrongful death case. Yates v. Pollock, 194 Cal. App. 3d 195, 239 Cal. Rptr. 383 (1987). There is authority, however, for allowing separate caps for the patient and a spouse claiming loss of consortium. Atkins v. Strayhorn, 223 Cal. App. 3d 1380, 273 Cal. Rptr. 231 (1990). The cap on non-economic damages has been held to be constitutional. Fein v. Permanente Medical Group, 38 Cal. 3d 137, 695 P.2d 665, 211 Cal. Rptr. 368 (1985) (also upholding the modification of the collateral source rule).


    I know you are coming from a medical background, but at the same time please recognize that not all of your colleagues are as competent as you are. These "bad doctors" ARE being allowed to practice. These "bad doctors" are being protected by boards that are not investigating and by other doctors who say nothing.

    California's medical board investigates only 20% of the 10,000 complaints it gets each year.

    Where quote was taken from

    OR

    National Practitioner Data Bank (NPDB): Only a small fraction of medical malpractice "repeat offenders" are disciplined for incompetence. According to a recently released NPDB report, there are about 5,000 physicians who have paid four or more medical malpractice judgments or settlements since 1990. But despite this red flag, very few of these physicians have been disciplined by state medical licensing boards or hospital credentialing committees. By the time a physician has paid four awards, he or she stands only a 15 percent chance of being sanctioned. Even physicians who have paid ten or more settle
     
  9. POLUNIS

    POLUNIS Jedi Youngling star 2

    Registered:
    Apr 3, 2002
    Jansons_Funny_Twin:

    As it should be.

    Many people in my dorm were saying, "There are torture houses in Iraq?"



    The ignorance of some people amazes me.


    They are probably willfully ignorant of the facts, are they not?

    Darth_Mischievous:

    Your figures are correct; thank you for posting them. This brings up this obvious point: one can only give tax cuts to the people who pay taxes. The vast majority of taxes are paid by higher-income Americans, not necessarily the "rich". There is no wealth tax...until one dies, that is.

    One does not need to make an outstanding salary in order to make it into the top 50% of wage earners. From what I have heard, One need only make above $30,000 per year, if that high.

    It is almost amusing to think of the implications of these facts whenever one hears the shrieks against "tax cuts for the rich". I am sure you know what I mean.

    President Bush is doing the right thing with his economic plan.
     
  10. Vaderize03

    Vaderize03 Manager Emeritus star 6 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Oct 25, 1999
    Thanks to TripleB, DarthMischievious, and KnightWriter on their compliments...it's very much appreciated :).

    Also, thanks to HermanSnerd for his post as well. There are many differing figures on the actual distribution of monies paid in this crisis; most of the information I posted was from speaking directly to the physicians with whom I work and being shown their insurance bills.

    One neurosurgeon, who left for NC, was charged $400,000 last year. No joke.

    I'll answer more specific stuff later, I'm at the hospital at the moment, but thanks again to all who read and complimented my post :).

    Peace,

    V-03
     
  11. Vaderize03

    Vaderize03 Manager Emeritus star 6 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Oct 25, 1999
    OK, just a few responses. I was a little heated when I wrote my other post, so I will try to be a little more objective here....

    Does a doctor have to screw up repeatedly before they are removed from practice? That is scary to me.

    And people wonder why I hate going to the doctor? Sheesh, go in for implants and come out a double amputee.


    No, of course not. I was using a figure of speech, that's all. But judging just what constitutes a "bad" doctor can vary highly amongst the different medical specialities.

    There is a saying in medicine: internists can kill you in a few days, surgeons in minutes to hours, and an anesthesiologist in about 10 seconds. When looking at cases of true malfeasance (versus unforseeable reactions to treatments/surgeries and bad outcomes of which the risk was acknowledged beforehand), it can be very, very difficult to trace back to exactly whom the blame goes in a malpractice case. To clarify: a patient comes in with chest pain. The ER doctor orders a chest x-ray, a 12-lead EKG, cardiac enzymes, a CBC, and a metabolic panel (for the non-health professionals among us, this would be the standard workup for the suspicion of what is called "cardiac", or due to a possible heart attack, chest pain. There are other causes, which I won't go into here). Now, because ER physicians are responsible for acute medical management, this doc calls in the cardiologist, who will take over the patient's care if and when he gets admitted. He also calls the patient's internal medicine or family doctor. All of them must communicate, confer, and reach a consensus on both immediate and more chronic issues relating to patient care.

    Now, let's say our patient degenerates. Now he needs a bypass. There is a question of his vascular anatomy, so an ultrasound or even a new type of CT scan (ultra-thin CT) is ordered. He is then taken to the OR, where the cardiac surgeon, anesthesiologist, and perfusion bypass technician must all work together to get him through his bypass surgery.



    My point with the above: if there is a problem, it can be very, very hard to figure out who to blame. Was it the anesthesiologist, not maintaining adequate blood pressure before the patient went on perfusion bypass? Was it the perfusionist? How about the surgeon, or the ultrasound technician or radiologist who read his numerous imaging studies.

    When a lawyer goes to a look at a suit, more oftentimes nowadays than not, they are looking for as many responsible parties as possible, rather than who is really at fault. By doing this, by looking to sue as many people affiliated with the case as possible, they make the search for the truly responsible party (the one that actually committed the most or worst malpratice) almost impossible. This is not to say that all of them couldn't have, but in this environment, physicians often close ranks and by doing so, cover up for the ones who may be bad doctors, the so-called "weakest link".

    So I guess in answer to the italicized text, no, most bad doctors don't make repeated mistakes, but the litigious environment which currently surrounds healthcare makes it nearly impossible for any physician to not feel threatened with the minions of the law embark on a search for the truth. And it's a shame, because it interferes with the administration of justice for those people who have suffered due to legitimate medical malpractice.

    suuuuure. The AMA is just a delicate flower of an organization

    Actually, the AMA is probably the weakest of the professional lobbies in the US. Their dues are not enforced, agendas not taken seriously by their own members, and their leadership too structureless and non-interested to effect true political change in Washington. Why else would Hillary Rodham Clinton have felt so comfortable slamming the door in their faces when she sat down in '92 to plan her revamp of the health care system? What was the consequence of her doing that? Nothing. You can be damned sure that if her hubby treated the NRA like that,
     
  12. irishjedi49

    irishjedi49 Jedi Master star 3

    Registered:
    Jul 23, 2002
    V-03 -- Remember, some of us lawyers are the ones out there defending the doctors ;) Personally, I get ill just watching all those ambulance-chaser commercials ("Have you been injured? Do you think maybe you might possibly have been injured at one point? Call us, we'll get you money!")

    I agree that tort reform is desperately needed in the medical world, for a lot of the reasons you pointed out. This is why I'm very happy Bush mentioned it in the State of the Union. Too many juries look at a sympathetic plaintiff and award insanely high punitive damages far in excess of the actual medical expenses. They don't sit back and think that they are the ones who pay the consequences later, when doctors become unable to pay the $100,000+ per year in insurance alone, and leave the states. It's happening in many states, including Mississippi, Nevada, West Virginia (where many high-level trauma centers have been effectively shut down), Florida, and Ohio -- where the trial lawyers managed to persuade the Supreme Court a few years ago (4-3 vote) that tort reform legislation was unconstitutional. We just elected another conservative justice to the bench, however, so hopefully the next time the legislation is passed it will stand.

    Tort reform doesn't mean, as has been pointed out, that lawsuits are barred. It simply discourages the filing of frivolous lawsuits based on the expectation of limitless punitive damages. Doctors generally perform at a high standard, but by the nature of the business, sometimes there are unexpected consequences. You can sue for malpractice. You can't (or shouldn't be able to) sue because of unhappy but unpreventable consequences. Personally, I'd like to see common sense break out over this (thank you, GWB) and keep doctors practicing in my state.
     
  13. Vaderize03

    Vaderize03 Manager Emeritus star 6 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Oct 25, 1999
    Excellent points and excellent post, IrishJedi.

    Peace,

    V-03
     
  14. chibiangi

    chibiangi Jedi Master star 4

    Registered:
    Jun 16, 2002
    When a lawyer goes to a look at a suit, more oftentimes nowadays than not, they are looking for as many responsible parties as possible, rather than who is really at fault.

    My first question is: why is it up to lawyers to do this in the first place? The only reason a lawyer is brought into a case, assuming the case is legitimate, is that someone has been harmed when that harm could have been prevented. What everyone seems to be forgetting is that the burden of proof is on the patient, not the other way around. Why aren't the medical boards and doctors policing themselved? Why is it that a doctors who have paid out in ten or more cases have only a 40% chance of being sanctioned?

    Secondly, a lawyer has to look at the entire chain and the hospital. If they go after just the doctor, the doctor can become insolvent and chances are the patient is never going to see any compensation.


    This is not to say that all of them couldn't have, but in this environment, physicians often close ranks and by doing so, cover up for the ones who may be bad doctors, the so-called "weakest link".

    If doctors are covering up for other doctors, then something is very wrong.

    I am very wary of any reform that lays blame on the victim, which is what capping of medical malpractice suits does. Tort reform does not mean we have to tell victims they are only worth $250,000.


    IMO, there are a few key issues to reform. I am not suggesting I know anything about the subject or that I have all the answers, but this is how it appears to me.

    The first being the proper investigation of medical complaints made by patients. California's medical board investigates only 20% of the 10,000 complaints it gets each year. We, in CA, hold criminals to the "3 strikes" standard, yet doctors can repeatedly make bad decisions at the expense of their patients health. Maybe if doctors were held to the same standard as criminals, they would be much more likely to point out that weakest link. I don't think that is a feasible solution nor am I suggesting starting something like this, but it does stand to reason. The chances are the medical board will NOT investigate your complaint. If your case was thrown on a pile and ignored, wouldn't you get an attorney?

    The second being the proper sanctioning of doctors who are found to have done wrong either on purpose or through negligence. I recognize that doctors are put in a position where every decision is an important one, but this is part of the job. Doctors need to be sanctioned and retrained under supervision if they are not doing their job correctly.

    The third being reform in terms of how a person can go about filing a suit. Medical malpractice should only be reserved for instances in which a person is actually harmed by a doctor and not because they were upset about the procedure turned out. For example, let's say a woman goes and gets FFF cups breast implants, despite the fact that her surgeon tells her that she will likely experience loss of elasticity, and decides that she hates the way they look and decides to sue the doctor. This is obviously a case of buyer's remorse and should not be considered in medical malpractice. However, the doctor still needs to use their judgement and not do a procedure just because money is being handed to them (ie the doctors who made Michael Jackson look that way should be out of practice). Also, there needs to be clear and informed consent. Patients need to know the seriousness of the procedures they are going to go through before they go through them. They need to know exactly what the risks are before going in.

    The fourth being disincentives for lawyers to file complaints without merit. Instead of making the cap $250,000 for the patient, how about making caps for the lawyer?


    The fifth being proper certification for doctors. Many of the malpractice suits are stemming from cosmetic procedures done by doctors who are not board certified in cosmetic surgery. This is why stupid stuff like liposuction
     
  15. TripleB

    TripleB Jedi Padawan star 4

    Registered:
    Oct 28, 2000
    If you want to talk about more ridiculous lawsuits, just check out this one below

    Cities Pay Big in Faulty Lawsuits

    Thursday, January 30, 2003

    NEW YORK ? People who get injured while committing a crime, or while failing to commit suicide, and then sue their cities for damages are reaping financial benefits at the public's expense.

    A woman who was lying on subway tracks when she was struck by a New York City train was awarded over $14 million last May, later reduced to about $10 million, by a jury that found her to be only 30 percent negligent for the incident.

    Seong Sil Kim, 36, claimed the train operator should have been able to stop in time after seeing her. The Transit Authority said the plaintiff was trying to kill herself because she suffered from postpartum depression. Kim suffered amputation of the right hand except for the thumb; multiple skull and facial bone fractures; fractures to the right radius and left toes; and lacerations of the face, abdomen and leg.

    In another instance, Angelo Delgrande shot and wounded his parents and himself in a June 1995 dispute. He then received surgery at a hospital in Westchester County, N.Y. That night, he yanked the tubes and monitoring devices from his body and tried to commit suicide by jumping off the second story of a parking garage. Now a paraplegic, Delgrande sued the hospital for failing to treat his depression and keep him indoors. He was awarded $9 million.

    And in Oakland, Calif., a bank robber didn't know the bag of cash he stole contained a time-delayed tear-gas canister that went off, scorched him and sped his arrest. He sued the bank and the police for $2 million for burning him.

    "These are some of the cases that make people rub their eyes and say, 'I can't believe it's real. Someone would have had to make up this case,'" said Walter Olson, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute. "But unfortunately, around the country, they're all too real."

    And legal critics say the practice has got to stop.

    "You have to wonder, what message does this send on individual responsibility?" Olson asked. "If money is going not just to the innocent bystanders but to the people who caused the accidents or injuries in the first place?"

    But the lawyers argue that even the people who caused the accidents have rights.

    "Just because somebody robbed a bank, doesn't mean that they have no legal rights whatsoever," said Mark Geistfeld, a professor at New York University's School of Law. "The idea that all of us deserve to be protected by the law, even while we're breaking the law, is something that we all will benefit from on a daily basis."

    In essence, people have the same rights if they're caught speeding or jaywalking as they would if they rob a bank or break out of jail.

    But Olson said the courts need to realize that people who set out to break the law should expect something bad to happen to them.

    "Not all judges invoke that principle," Olson said. "I think more of them should."

    New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg is one local official who's had enough.

    Last May, Bloomberg announced a $560 million set of tort reform measures aimed at reining in these types of lawsuits, among other things. One portion of his bill requires that if the plaintiff is "predominantly" ? or more than 50 percent ? at fault for causing the incident in question, he or she should not recover damages from the city.

    "The city?s tort payouts are larger than the budgets of most city agencies," the mayor said last year. "In fact, they are bigger than the budget of most municipalities in New York.

    In 1978, the city paid out $21 million in tort payouts and in 2001, that number had skyrocketed to more than half a billion dollars.

    "This money could be far better spent on social issues ? including better schools, new teachers, more firefighters and police officers ? and improving our infrastructure, especially as the city faces a fiscal crisis," Bloomberg said.

    Fox News' Rick Folbaum and Liza Porteus contributed to this report.


     
  16. Obi-Wan McCartney

    Obi-Wan McCartney Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Aug 17, 1999
    The thing of it is, there aren't THAT many frivilous medical-malpractice lawsuits, just enough to make the god-like doctors fear someone. As they should, I think it's a good idea to keep sloppy doctors on their toes and good doctors staying good in fear of something.

    In addition, you can't cap the expenses, because you have no idea how much expense it would be. You NEED the big bucks settlement either way if you are a law firm. Either you screen very carefully for solid cases or you take shloads of cases and hope to hit the lottery. Therefore, either way you need a big payout (especially because either way you go, it's expensive for the law firm) in order to make suing doctors a profitable practice. Sure, some doctors are wrongfully accused, but just about all those get thrown out. It's just that doctors are such humanitarians that it shakes them to their very core to be questioned.

    HA!
     
  17. Darth Mischievous

    Darth Mischievous Jedi Grand Master star 6

    Registered:
    Oct 12, 1999
    The thing of it is, there aren't THAT many frivilous medical-malpractice lawsuits, just enough to make the god-like doctors fear someone. As they should, I think it's a good idea to keep sloppy doctors on their toes and good doctors staying good in fear of something.


    No offense, but that is the most ignorant statement I've read in this forum in a long time.

    I suggest you do a little bit more research into the massive amounts of lawsuits by tort lawyers that occur and the massive effect they have on the medical costs.

    I don't think anyone here is saying MD's shouldn't be held accountable for medical mistakes. What we are saying is that too many tort lawyers are taking advantage of the system and driving up health care costs while they themselves get rich off the system. This is putting doctors out of business due to the extreme cost of medical malpractice insurance and it is driving up the cost of health care.
     
  18. Jediflyer

    Jediflyer Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Dec 5, 2001
    While this is kind of off the current topic (but still well withing the boundaries of the thread), I think there is a major piece of the State of the Union that everybody seems to be missing. In the last few minutes, Bush said:

    America is a strong nation and honorable in the use of our strength. We exercise power without conquest and sacrifice for the liberty of strangers.

    Americans are a free people who know that freedom is the right of every person and the future of every nation. The liberty we prize is not America's gift to the world, it is God's gift to humanity.



    This is a major change in our foreign policy, one that many of you have seen me advocating on this board. Previously, our foreign policy and intervention in other nations was mainly selfish, protecting our interests and such. Now it seems that our foreign policy and decisions to intervene will be based more on bringing the same freedoms that we enjoy to the oppressed of the world.

    Do you think this a good or bad thing?
    Do you believe that this will really result in a change of attitude in foreign policy?
     
  19. Vaderize03

    Vaderize03 Manager Emeritus star 6 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Oct 25, 1999
    I'll get to chibiangi's post later tonight. Good points there, but some of his suggestions are already in place, and have been manipulated and abused by both the legal system and insurers.

    McCartney-I'm surprised at you. The days of the "God-like" doctor are LONG gone. Why would you advocate further stresses against an already high-stress field? Doctor's should "fear" something? They already do-they fear not being able to help their patients, they feel constantly reminded of their own mortality and the limits of medical technology when somebody dies, they fear being screwed by a malpractice suit. There's more than enough fear without adding any more.

    Peace,

    V-03
     
  20. Lyta_Skywalker

    Lyta_Skywalker Jedi Youngling star 2

    Registered:
    Jul 6, 2002
    chibiangi,

    Unfortunately that is not really the case, these days almost anyone admitted to an ER will be bombarded by lawyers wanting to take your 'case' even if nothing was done wrong. We are bombarded day and night by commercials proclaiming "Have you been injured, misdiagnosed" etc. Right now we have a lawyer up here wanting to take on your case if your diagnosis of Cervical Cancer resulted in a hystorectomy. Sounds good right? It would if hystorectomy weren't the first stage of treatment for Cervical Cancer. So yes, there are WAY too many frivalous medical malpractice law suits, and that hurts everyone, the doctors because their insurance is outragous, and the patients, because doctors are afraid to treat anything agressively/non agressively for fear of causing a law suit (I know this from personal experience, when about 10 years ago, I fell on the ice, and had whiplash, the doctor didn't want to touch me for fear I was going to sue him) and finally, those who really are hurt by doctor's mistakes and cannot get the settlement they deserve because of reforms to keep the frivalous cases out of court.

    So everyone is hurt by the bombardment of frivalous law suits, even if you think it isn't.

    Jaded
     
  21. Jediflyer

    Jediflyer Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Dec 5, 2001
    Well, I guess everyone did not miss that part of the speech.

    Howard Fineman's Take on Bush's new policy

    His view of it is more negative than mine, implying that the U.S. is trying to control the world like we did a century ago with Teddy Roosevelt.

     
  22. chibiangi

    chibiangi Jedi Master star 4

    Registered:
    Jun 16, 2002
    V03, I'm a she. The "chibi" part of my nick means "short" in Japanese and "angi" part is my nickname :D

    Lyta: I am not saying that good judgement should not be used. I am not saying that something needs to be done to keep people from abusing the system. However, I do not believe that capping the awards a patient can receive is the solution. I feel that caps are a band-aid solution to the problem and that if people want true reform we must seek out all possible options. Quite frankly, I find a $250,000 cap disgusting because it does not take into account the severity of an injury nor does it take into account inflation and changes in the economic climate.

     
  23. chibiangi

    chibiangi Jedi Master star 4

    Registered:
    Jun 16, 2002
    The days of the "God-like" doctor are LONG gone.

    They may be if you have access to an excellent doctor willing to listen to what you have to say about your health. However, after going through the LA County clinics for the poor and uninsured, I can tell you the majority of the doctors in the system a) are foreign and have questionable communication skills and b) very much have the "god" complex[1]. I will save what I *really* think about them for PMs ;D

    [1]With the exception of the residents at UCLA-Olive View. They are all UCLA residents, ie learning doctors. However, it's walk-in treatment so each time you go, you start over.
     
  24. irishjedi49

    irishjedi49 Jedi Master star 3

    Registered:
    Jul 23, 2002
    V-03 - Thanks :)

    chibiangi - You raise some valid points that are worth responding to. I can try to answer some of them.

    I am very wary of any reform that lays blame on the victim, which is what capping of medical malpractice suits does. Tort reform does not mean we have to tell victims they are only worth $250,000.

    I don't agree that limiting damage awards lays any blame on a victim. To the contrary, if the plaintiff is being awarded damages, then he won the case. Limits on punitive damages means that hospitals and insurance companies will not be held liable for crippling punitive damage awards over and above compensation for the actual injury. This doesn't mean patients are "worth" "only" $250,000. It means that's how much they can recover for non-economic injury.

    The first being the proper investigation of medical complaints made by patients. California's medical board investigates only 20% of the 10,000 complaints it gets each year. We, in CA, hold criminals to the "3 strikes" standard, yet doctors can repeatedly make bad decisions at the expense of their patients health.

    The conclusion that it is bad that 80 percent of complaints made to the California board arenot investigated, requires an assumption that ALL of those complaints are valid. That's probably too much of an assumption to hold. Presumably the Board has governing standards to sort out complaints which on their face seem to suggest or not suggest negligence by a doctor. Maybe those standards should be made clearer, so that people understand how their complaint will be treated. (Maybe V-03 knows more about this.)

    The second being the proper sanctioning of doctors who are found to have done wrong either on purpose or through negligence. I recognize that doctors are put in a position where every decision is an important one, but this is part of the job. Doctors need to be sanctioned and retrained under supervision if they are not doing their job correctly.

    I don't think anyone would disagree with this. If doctors really do not meet their professional standards, then they should be sanctioned. And there is a system in place to accomplish that oversight. It probably doesn't require, though, that injured patients be awarded punitive damages far in excess of their actual injuries, though, because that awards a single patient a windfall at the expense of hospitals and insurance companies who pay out, then consequently raise insurance premiums on all doctors to prohibitive levels, in effect punishing competent doctors and the patients who they can't afford to take on, for the negligent actions of one doctor.

    The third being reform in terms of how a person can go about filing a suit. Medical malpractice should only be reserved for instances in which a person is actually harmed by a doctor and not because they were upset about the procedure turned out.

    I agree, and that's exactly the point. Too many lawsuits are being filed not because they were harmed by any negligence of a doctor but because they are simply upset with the results of a given procedure -- which may happen sometimes, unfortunately, but it's not always preventable. The consequence of not stemming the flood of frivolous lawsuits is, as Lyta said, that doctors are afraid to exercise their professional judgment, or take on new patients, at all, lest they be sued.

    Also, there needs to be clear and informed consent. Patients need to know the seriousness of the procedures they are going to go through before they go through them. They need to know exactly what the risks are before going in.

    This is undisputed: there is a doctrine of informed consent, and doctors could be liable for malpractice for breaching the duty to inform. There are different standards in different states about what is required to be disclosed -- some states use the standard of what a reasonable patient would want to know (the minority rule); some the standard of what a reasonable doctor would disclose under the circumstances
     
  25. irishjedi49

    irishjedi49 Jedi Master star 3

    Registered:
    Jul 23, 2002
    Yikes, that may be the longest post I've made yet on the boards ... sorry 'bout that :) Just a subject I've been concerned about for a long time that I was glad to see finally getting some national attention on Tuesday.

    Though I'm not sure tort reform in this area is necessarily appropriate for federal involvement -- I think it's probably better dealt with at the state level -- it would help to have the President's support on the matter.
     
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