ATLA: "There is no healthcare crisis"

The ATLA president talks about malpractice:

The only places where people have trouble finding an OBGYN to do any procedure are in rural, poverty-stricken areas, where the OBGYNs don’t want to live and practice. I do a lot of obstetrical negligence cases, and the cases seem to come out of poor areas. You see people getting better healthcare in big, urban centers, for the most part — although mistakes are made there, too — and that’s where the doctors want to live.
They want to live in nice places with good schools where they can raise their families, and they don’t want to live out in the country and they certainly don’t want to be the only OBGYN in some rural county, meaning they have to cover all of the deliveries all the time and never get a day off. It’s working conditions that make this difference; it’s not medical malpractice premiums.

(via This Makes Me Sick)

Comments

Anonymous
Dear God, the man sounds like a freakin idiotic jackass!
Anonymous
The lawyer in the link said that ob/gyn doctors have increased 25% since 1990.
1) What source is he using for that statistic?
2) If thats true, then it makes me even more skeptical of the so-called “doctor shortage” that exists. Personally I think the shortage is a myth
Anonymous
I have no idea whether the number of ob/gyn’s is 25% higher than it was in 1990. Even if it is true, keep in mind that:
a.) The U.S. population has increased from 248,00 in 1990 to exactly 300,000 today- a growth of 21%.
b.) There has been a large decrease in the number of family practice physicians who still do deliveries, there are a large number of ob/gyn’s who have dropped the “ob” portion of their practices all together, and more still who have at least limited their “high risk” services.
Considering these facts together, I think it is reasonable to infer that while nominally there may be more ob/gyns in the country, there are less doctors doing deliveries per capita, especially in the high risk realm.
(Of course, I haven’t studied this myself but if the fact that “…but everybody studies everything in the United States, so somebody’s probably studied it sometime” is a good enough argument for the president of the ATLA then its good enough for me…)
Anonymous
“Personally I think the shortage is a myth”
I guess the regular shipping of neurosurgery/hand surgery patients out of city AND state where I work must be a “myth” or “dream” too. Please tell me how I can wake up
Anonymous
The guy in this article sounds like a complete twit.
However, he is correct when he talks about working conditions in rural areas. Even in rural communities that are not poverty-stricken, it’s an issue. Many physicians don’t want to be on call one or more weekends a month. They don’t like being professionally and socially isolated. Suitable employment for a spouse can be a huge deal.
It’s not just a shortage, it’s a maldistribution, with some regions of the U.S. getting the short end of the stick.
With appropriate support, rural practice can actually be very rewarding. In fact I would challenge Kevin to find some positive articles about rural practice and share them here on his blog.
Anonymous
So, can any of you prove him wrong?
DBR
Anonymous said…
So, can any of you prove him wrong?
11:11 AM
Can you prove him RIGHT?
Anonymous
DBR:
This is just one of our JD lurkers who want’s to be a fly in the ointment. He has no intention of looking anything up.
Anonymous
You’re all attacking the man personally, but so far not one of you can do anything other than shoot the messenger. If he’s wrong, let’s see it. It’s your claim that he is.
Are you actually disagreeing with the premise that rural areas have always struggled with retaining physicians or that for the most part one can find better care in urban areas? Regardless of malpractice premiums? It’s not like a lack of rural physicians is a new phenomenon.
So, can anyone prove him wrong?
*crickets chirping*
Anonymous
Let’s see you want me to waste my time on someone who (with one exception) cannot back up anything he has to say to suit YOUR academic arguement.
Thanks but no thanks I am too busy being a doc. I am going to work right,now enjoy your holiday weekend off counsler.
Anonymous
I think he’s wrong. Can I reference any studies? Have I studied it personally? No. But this is America, and everyone studies everything, so I’m sure someone else has studied it at some point, and so therefore what I posit must be right.
Anonymous
“you’re just shooting the messenger”
Ahh hello…this messenger didn’t back up his arguement.
Anonymous
In fact, he did, in the original ATLA press release, it was footnoted to this source:
“[14] “Physician Characteristics and Distribution in the U.S.,” American Medical Association, 2006 edition, p.133;”
That’s gotta hurt, considering it comes from your own lobbying organization.
Your turn to back it up. Or pipe down until you can.
Anonymous
That source was not cited in the text that we are all reading, so I’m not sure why you expected everyone to know about it.
Anyhow, it appears that the report referenced is related to physician distributions and was most likely the basis for his claim that there are 25% more ob/gyns now that in 1990 (which no one here has denied) or that there are proportionately fewer ob/gyn’s in rural areas (which, again, no one here has denied).
Its the rest of the article (which he even admits are his opinions and based on nothing more than his own anecdotal experiences) that people disagree with.
As for shooting the messenger… yeah, that’s the whole point. See the very first post. This guy isn’t just some lawyer on the street, he is the freakin’ president of the ATLA, and his arguments come across as downright idiotic. He is making himself and his entire profession look like morons who can’t form basic logical axioms, which does indeed weaken the message.
Anonymous
“That source was not cited in the text that we are all reading, so I’m not sure why you expected everyone to know about it.”
Most interviews don’t come with footnotes. A simple Google search turned it up. When physicians make claims about the law, do you automatically believe them, or do you require footnotes?
“Its the rest of the article (which he even admits are his opinions and based on nothing more than his own anecdotal experiences) that people disagree with.”
On what basis? Do you disagree that healthcare is better in urban areas generally? Or that more people, including physicians, want to live in cities or nice suburbs? What is there to dispute about that?
“This guy isn’t just some lawyer on the street, he is the freakin’ president of the ATLA, and his arguments come across as downright idiotic.”
In what way? Everything he says is true. Is the truth idiotic simply because you don’t like the speaker? So far, you have been unable to disprove a thing he said, so who is the idiot?
Anonymous
“Everything he says is true”
Why because you said so? He stated it was his opinion. Are you going to quote this as mantra without support just because you agree with what he says. Good luck in a court with that arguement counsler.
Anonymous
How about you show me what he says was false? The evidence produced by YOUR lobbying organization proves him correct.
Do you have any FACTS showing otherwise?
Anonymous
Are you kidding me?
Why do we think he sounds like a moron? See Anon 7:03.
Why do we think his message was wrong? Because he speaks his opinions as though they are truths. In fact, he didn’t even fess up to lacking any studies or data regarding his claim that “juries are rather frugal with their non-economic payouts” until the interviewer pushed him to back that up.
No one is disputing the factual basis of his claims that there are more ob/gyns (nominally anyway) or that they are disporportionately distributed geographically. If you would bother to read back, you’d see that Anon 10:54 and Anon 9:39 have addressed that specifically.
No one has even tried to argue that lifestyle considerations don’t play a part in where doctors choose to practice. But this guy makes the leap to saying that malpractice premiums have nothing to do with one’s decision not to perform high-risk procedures, rural or urban (a laughable stance-why else would they choose not to do them?).
How do you argue against someone’e opinion or anecdotal experience? I can’t PROVE that his opinions are wrong (even if I think they are ill-informed), and I can’t PROVE what he has or hasn’t seen in his personal experiences.

ATLA: "There is no healthcare crisis"

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