Guest Posted February 3, 2003 Report Share Posted February 3, 2003 In California the Med Malpractice issue came to the front in the 70s and 80s. My father was an OBGYN for 50 years and pained over every increase. Finally he joined a Coop that strictly screened members and internally dealt with claims, it was only then that stability in rates occurred for him. Skid is correct, only now can we possibly have reform, with the majority leader being a MD and the president not being trained in the Law or a member of the Bar . Oh, and BTW, I too hold a Bar Card in Calif but after my stint with the DA no longer practice... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dustbowl Posted February 3, 2003 Report Share Posted February 3, 2003 Dr. Skiddmarket. I am not interested in changing your mind. I am interested in facts only. Please refrain from your not so subtle sniping, it's not becoming to you and adds nothing to the argument. I have read your horror stories about the poor doctors, are you interested in hearing about the horror stories that my clients, and many others could tell about being victims of medical malpractice? I bet not. The bottom line is you should be interested in finding the true cause of the situation. If not, then this discussion will degenerate into a not very informative "who is right, Democrat/Republican, rich doctor vs. poor victim" argument. Rally on!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SkiddMarket Posted February 3, 2003 Report Share Posted February 3, 2003 Counselor. I agree- there are some awful doctors. I've participated in record reviews for attorneys in the past. I've seen records of care that if that care had been provided to my family, I wouldn't have sued- I'd have SHOT the SOB doctor. But you are missing the point completely. Malpractice WILL occur. More often with bad doctors, but even with good doctors. No one is perfect. And even perfect care can result in suits. One day, the attorney representing our malpractice group spoke to the group. I'll never forget it. He said if we wish to take care of Retinopathy of Prematurity patients, we were welcome to do it. But if the child ends up blind through no fault of ours, the PI attorney will put the little blind child in front of the jury, spin him around a few times, he'll take a few steps, fall to the floor, and every jury in the country will award him 3 million dollars. I never forgot that. Have you ever worked in a Nursing Home? I did. In college. It's a VERY difficult job. Many patients are confused, and aside from strapping the residents down (Ooops- that's a cause for suit), there WILL be falls. It's inevitable, unless you have such a high staff to patient ratio that the home is unable to operate. Dutiful son or daughter already feels guilty for putting Mom in the home- hey.... why not sue? You're never going to convince me that Trial Attorneys are protecting the public. Not when they receive 33% of the judgement. Why should a physician committing malpractice, no matter HOW heinous, entitle an attorney to a million bucks in cash as payment for services rendered. I guess we'll have to agree to disagree. I do appreciate the discussion. Happy trading. One of us may need it as a new primary source of income! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dustbowl Posted February 3, 2003 Report Share Posted February 3, 2003 Cats and dogs, good doctor, cats and dogs. This is a big issue, full of emotion, full of politics. I am not against you or the medical business at all. Hell, I was a hospital administrator for many years. OK, truce. At least we have one thing in common, we are both card carrying Stoolies. Good luck with everything. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShitEatingGrinner Posted February 3, 2003 Report Share Posted February 3, 2003 As Nader said in the last election, the big bidness interests are out to close off access of the little people to the court system. This is what tort reform is all about. Limit injury awards to a nice low number and corporations can rip people off and later pay their "penance..." one hundredth of what they've stolen or defrauded. It's all more of the same attempt by the powerful to control and pauperize the masses. Another step along the road to a corporate/facist state. It's like arbitration clauses you MUST sign if you want some "product" you need. Agree to let some "unbiased" third party settle your case outside of court and away from a jury. Shame on Fleckenstein for his non-critical, kneejerk posturing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Goldmember Posted February 3, 2003 Report Share Posted February 3, 2003 What we need is a thousand of them at the bottom of the sea! Investment borkers and all their in-house lice and parasites that is. The insurance companies, not to mention just about everyone else, were FLEECED by these charletans as slickly as John Q Public was. The med malpractice carriers are unfortunate victims of a double wammy. I could understand reform for medical malpractice suits but just watch the snake-oil Wall Struck crowd have this include asbestos and the analcysts who, for one mere examlple, issued BUY ratings on Enron right down to a buck. I recall reading how in the unwinding and aftermath of the 1929 bubble the class action suits against Wall Struck didn't reach their peak until 1937-38, with Kennedy and the newly formed SEC doing the criminal roasting as well peaking in that time frame. Anyone for a war distraction? They always conveniently and coincidentally provide a sideshow around the peak of bloodlust for borkers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest yobob1 Posted February 3, 2003 Report Share Posted February 3, 2003 The whole medical/insurance/legal triad is rapidly pricing itself right out of business. Rising unemployment, depriving ex-workers of med insurance, will futher shrink the pool and pressure rates higher. At some point not far away nobody will be able to afford helath care, the insurance for it, or the lawyer to sue the doctor who wouldn't provide care because he has no insurance. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
machinehead Posted February 3, 2003 Report Share Posted February 3, 2003 Skidd Market, I very much appreciated your comments. The tort lottery also affects engineers, inventors and product designers. BARE says they have nothing to worry about if they did nothing wrong. Well, b.s. Remember the guy who had a heart attack when pulling the starter cord of his lawnmower, and sued Sears for millions? There's nothing inherently wrong with pull-start mowers, or any type of equipment which requires human effort. Some people are in poor cardiovascular health, primed to collapse upon making an exertion. Why should that unfortunate coincidence justify a lawsuit? Since I like to mess around in the woods, I got a 3-injection series of the Lymerix vaccine. A few people claimed side effects, sued the manufacturer, and now Lymerix is off the market. Thousands will probably get Lyme disease, some chronically, as a result of this useful product being withdrawn. Lyme disease is a nasty infection, spread by a first cousin of the syphilis spirochete. I'm glad I got in under the wire, before the tort vultures vandalized this little corner of the health care system. Clearly there's a deep philisophical divide between Skidd Market and Dustbowl. On a level debating field, I would be content to let the chips fall where they may, even if our side lost. But legislatures are not a level playing field. They are dominated, usually majority-dominated, by lawyers. Lawyers passing laws to create work for their own profession is a scandalous example of self-dealing, in complete disregard for the flagrant conflict of interest. The only remedy is reducing the percentage of lawyers in the population to the level which prevails in normal, healthy societies elsewhere in the world. No, I'm not proposing genocide here. Just drastically reducing the number of law schools in order to cut capacity. Those empty law schools can be turned into schools for doctors, nurses, engineers, musicians, artists, writers ... professions which add value rather than redistributing wealth. Yeah, that's biased and is going to deeply offend lawyers. I'm sorry, but it's a value judgement, and it's really the way I feel. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Goldmember Posted February 3, 2003 Report Share Posted February 3, 2003 Machinehead, funny you mention Lyme Disease. I was delivered into this world by Dr. Laverne Kindree who, along with his daughter, also a pysician were pioneers in finding Lyme disease was carried by ticks here on the wet coast, and were instrumental in generating awareness and treatment here. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slothrop Posted February 3, 2003 Report Share Posted February 3, 2003 But who pays for the lawyers in the legislatures, Machinehead? They are bought and paid for by the corporations who make campaign contributions. By your logic, while we're eliminating law schools, we should also be eliminating business schools and MBA factories. Actually, I kind of like the idea... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SkiddMarket Posted February 3, 2003 Report Share Posted February 3, 2003 I was absolutely amazed when the Democrats in Congress balked at removing liability for side effects of smallpox vaccinations. What company would be willing to sell million dollar lottery tickets for a few bucks a dose? The answer is none. In fact, they were DONATED by a European manufacturer directly to the US government. So now, instead of the possibility to collect medical bills plus a $250K cap on pain and suffering, thanks to our trial lawyers if you have a problem, you will be free to sue the US government. Good luck. Expect to see this more and more until true tort reform is finally a reality. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dustbowl Posted February 3, 2003 Report Share Posted February 3, 2003 Dr. Skiddmarket, Before you get yourself in a major spin zone again here, there are already limits on lawsuits against federal and state governmental entities. Its called the Governmental Tort Claims Act. The government caps damages awards within the Act. Looks like the government beat the doctors to the punch many years ago. This also seems paradoxical to other opinions posted here that lawyers own the legislatures. If lawyers owned the legislatures, why would they vote in a law limiting their business? Could it be that those nasty lawyers either don't control the legislatures or did the nasty old lawyers in the legislature do something for the common good? Also, the trend of lawyer/legislators has been in a downtrend for many years. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SkiddMarket Posted February 3, 2003 Report Share Posted February 3, 2003 That's exactly what I'm talking about. The government is jumping through hoops to allow necessary products to come to market without companies being exposed to unlimited liability. There is CLEARLY a problem- it's not incompetent doctors, or heartless corporations. It's a tort system out of control and the problem is currently being dealt with in every state in the Union and on the Federal level. Pigs get slaughtered- both in the market, and at the Bar. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dustbowl Posted February 3, 2003 Report Share Posted February 3, 2003 A tort system out of control, huh? Are you aware that the vast majority of lawsuits filed in this country involves one corporation suing another corporation? This is a fact. There is no explosion in tort filings across the country and those tort filings pale in comparison to business vs. business litigation. Let's deal with facts here and not political spin, please. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShitEatingGrinner Posted February 3, 2003 Report Share Posted February 3, 2003 Dust, don't expect to win any arguments with the facts Nader made the point about the "illusion" that Americans are litigious in his campaign speech. He asked if anyone in the room had ever been involved in a lawsuit as a plaintiff. In a room of about 300, About 5%-maybe 10% percent raised their hands. Yet to hear the mainstream media tell it, we're all out suing the shit out of each other over not saying "good morning" to our neighbors or some other asinine reason. The "outrageous" awards make for big sensational news, but they are not the norm. They get reported so heavily because people like Murdoch, who control the flow of info, favors shutting the little guys out of the court system. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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