Posted on 08/23/2009 12:20:14 PM PDT by ScaniaBoy
It’s plain common sense! Who can argue that tort reform is not needed when the premiums for malpractice insurance are so sky high, and when lawyers lurk like starving rodents around hospitals looking for chumps they can talk into suing for virtually anything.
It’s such a scam! The lawyers know that at the very worst, they won’t get as much as they dream about, but they are supremely confident that they are sure to get something.
If these jackels had to pony up some major bucks out of their own damned pockets when one of their pie in the sky, let’s-shoot-for-the-moon-and-hope-we-get-a-stupid-jury lawsuits went wahooney-shaped on them, they would be a lot less eager to clog up the courtrooms.
Absent the pressure from those cannibals, insurance rates might come down a bit and doctors might be more willing to pass a bit of savings on to the patients.
If you read the excerpt, he does complain that the doctor didn’t tell him about any mitigating treatments. I don’t know how long it took him to find the replacement doctor.
Regardless of how good or bad his claim is, I think it’s a great illustration of how perspective changes when one perceives being wronged by a “bad doctor.”
There is a lot of mental shouting on this thread, and little open discussion. I don’t have a dog in this fight (and I hope I never do), other than the same general dog that everyone starts out with. I can do without the drama.
We can throw statistics back and forth all day, but you will never convince me of the fairness or efficiency of a system under which doctors in certain high risk specialties can count on being sued every year or two.
What if they commit malpractice every year or two?
You, and a whole bunch of others, seem to operate in this fairy tale land where the only people who sue for malpractice are doing so in a frivolous manner. Then, there is the move towards “tort reform” where pretty much the only people who get the shaft, are those who had a good enough case to win at trial.
In other words, the totally illogical result is, because some people might make frivolous claims, we’ll protect the doctor from worthwhile claims.
Medical malpractice is a real thing. It happens a lot. That may not be a happy reality, but it is reality. Estimates are 100,000- to 200,000 people die each year from negligent medical care. Who knows how many are injured.
I suspect it will not seem so frivolous should it happen to you or a loved one.
parsy, who has seen people change their mind when it happens to them, like Frank Cornelius above.
Since the numbers of CP infants has not fallen, in the face of increased c-sections for those trouble indications brought up by John Edwards, I do think that we have proven at much cost and some deaths that CP is not caused by not doing a C-section.
Whether or not there are other and valid reasons for doing a C-section is entirely beside the point.
If you have a failed option, there is no need to provide a working option to know enough to stop doing the failing thing. The other option is to not do something worse than useless - a C-section that only raises the risks to the health of the mother. I don't need to know how to prevent or cure CP to know that it's better if the mother has a lower chance of death.
Here’s something interesting for you to review. All about c-sections. I pulled you out an interesting little tidbit.
http://crosscut.com/2009/08/06/health-medicine/19144/
With childbirth, the incentives all go the other way. On average, Medicaid pays $5,000 more for a C-section than for a vaginal birth, and private insurance pays a far greater premium. You don’t have to be a cynic to wonder if that could have something to do with the rise in unnecessary C-sections.
NO! NO! IT CAN’T BE THAT! NOT HERE IN CASABLANCA!
Only evil trial lawyers are greedy. Doctors are never greedy. Doctors don’t even care about money. It’s got to be that John Edwards behind all this.
parsy, who is shocked, just shocked to think doctors might be greedy
Sometimes people who aren’t in business don’t understand. Cutting business costs doesn’t always equal lower product costs.
The bottom market price may eventually be set by cost+markup.
The average market price is set by what the market will bear.
Obviously, the market will bear what the average doctor is now paying. No insurance company rushed to lower their prices in Indiana despite having tort reform passed, because selling a product for less than the market will bear is not good business sense. Businesses do not reduce their prices out of the goodness of their hearts when their costs go down. They are happy to be more profitable.
Now, if insurance companies were allowed to compete across state lines, and maybe if newer companies could enter the field with fewer barriers, then we might see more competition and therefore likely lower prices. THEN we may get closer to something like cost+markup. THEN tort reform may have a chance at putting pressure on lowering prices.
I could tell some scary stories about doctors who have been drunk at work for years without getting sued, etc., who have caused massive suffering and death to their patients.
I just went to the doctor a while ago for heartburn and I felt like I was being sold a car while he whipped out a pamphlet and tried to get me to have my gallbladder taken out. I asked him how sure he had to be that my gallbladder was the problem before he’d take it out. He said he didn’t have to be sure because the surgery was “no big deal.” I told him that unnecessary surgery is a big deal to me. However, in CA I was almost killed by doctors who kept telling me the pain was cramps or just mental...until they finally removed my abscessed appendix. What a difference. Is the Indiana doc more happy to perform unnecessary operations because he doesn’t fear getting sued as often? Like the McAllen docs were performing unnecessary tests? I wonder.
Thank you.
Your gall bladder experience is just what the Texas doctors were talking about above. Taking it out makes them more money.
I think some tort reform might be a good idea, but it should be limited to some procedural issues, like having an expert affidavit PRIOR to filing suit. Extend the statute of limitations to allow time for this. The only problem is this would tend to prevent little cases of malpractice to go forward. So maybe only require in cases over $50,000 or so.
And you are right. Tort reform does not lower overall health care costs. Insurance company competition would lower the costs or at least the rate of increase. So would streamlining paperwork.
What gets my goat is the wahoos who holler that tort reform is going to make some big huge difference in health care cost and that the system is just swamped with frivolous claims. BS. BS. BS.
There is more abuse of the system from the doctor/insurance company/defense counsel side of the aisle than the plaintiffs side.
On your gall bladder, might want to have your pancreas function checked if you haven’t and check for reflux.
parsy, who had his out
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