Medical liability reform a must for health reform
This New York Times editorial highlights the need for medical liability reform under the current health care reform package. Medical justice reform -- if done right -- will lower costs and improve access.
The Times gets the diagnosis correct, but their prescription rules out the most successful form of liability laws: caps on non-econcomic damages.
MALPRACTICE REFORM Missing from these bills is any serious attempt to rein in malpractice costs. (Trial lawyers, major supporters of the Democratic Party, have seen to that.) Malpractice awards do drive up insurance premiums for doctors in high-risk specialties, and there is some evidence that doctors engage in “defensive medicine” by performing tests and treatments primarily to prove they are not negligent should they get sued.
Patients who are injured because of a doctor’s or a hospital’s negligence must have recourse. We favor reforms that would try to compensate injured people fairly and promptly — perhaps through mediation or expert tribunals — but would not prevent them from filing suit as a last resort or cap the awards they could receive. Even then, the savings might be modest. Doctors mostly perform high-cost tests because they want to help their patients and get paid handsomely for doing so.
Read more at www.nytimes.com
