Trial lawyers helping doctors’ malpractice rates?

Trial lawyers are asking regulators to consider seeking a rollback of malpractice rates at Connecticut Medical Insurance Co., saying the premiums for doctors appear excessive in light of the company’s profits and surplus.
Carl D. Anderson, president of the Connecticut Trial Lawyers Association, sent a letter Tuesday to Insurance Commissioner Susan F. Cogswell urging a “thorough examination” of Connecticut Medical’s malpractice rates.

More likely, they don’t want high malpractice rates to be an excuse for tort reform and caps:

Trial lawyers have been clamoring for lower medical malpractice premiums in recent years for at least two reasons. The lawyers want to make sure the insurance remains available and affordable to physicians because it’s a source of money for malpractice victims and attorneys’ fees.
In addition, the lawyers object to caps on pain and suffering damages and don’t want high premiums to be used to justify them. So far, Connecticut legislators have not passed such limits on damages, despite heavy lobbying by physicians and insurers.

Comments

TAPayne
tort reform for medical malpractice?there is absolutely no need for such.what is needed is to stop the practice of credentialing people without the proper level of intellectual and academic capacity as medical professionals as social engineering projects ie Goals 2000 project.if a medical student needs the second two years of medical school (clinical studies)in order to raise a grade point average to “C” due to poor performance in the first two (academic studies)this person should NOT receive a medical degree. A “C” average may be sufficient for some professions, but not for any medical profession and absolutely not to receice an M.D.this simple correction in practices with show a huge drop in medical malpractice cases over time as the credentialed professionals are phased out by attrition
you also might consider that other forms of suits such as product liability and such would decrease if corporations were more interested in what their products will do once diseminated,rather than if they will make more off of the sales than they project they will pay in awards, so if you remove these awards or limit them it will be easier for these companies to figure this into their products and have even less consideration of the harm they do as even if the number of suits goes up they will still be able to maintain profitability, so look at who wants this reform and their hidden agendas
never answer an unanswered question with an unquestioned answer
lawyersux
Moron: A school in my state just outlawed the playing of “tag” amongst children due to fear of litigation. My best friend was the valedictorian of our med school class and has been sued, I finished near the top and I’ve been sued, a nurse in my hospital was sued and can’t get Homeowner’s insurance because her dog got excited and knocked over a person walking on her lawn. We can’t practice medicine in many specailties because they are being raped by Lawyers. What the hell does this have to do with “C” students in medical school? The most raped specialties, ie Neurosurgery and OB-GYN is filled with the best of breed. Are they all incompetent.
Anonymous
“A “C” average may be sufficient for some professions, but not for any medical profession”
I can’t wait for criminalpsychopath’s response to this one!
I certainly don’t think anyone with a C average in college would be admitted to medical school. Then again I expect the bar to be lowered as the A students choose more promising careers.
The funny thing is, in legal circles, it is rumored that it is the C students that make all the money. So I suppose these are the folks exploiting the system. I would argue that we should apply the same standard to the legal profession. Maybe then the need for legal reform would vanish.
TAPayne
well, Valevictorians make mistakes they are accountable for, but they arent so prevelent as to cause a rise in insurance rates for all others,and if some doesnt restrain their poorly trained domestic pet they are also responsible for any injury incurred, as to ob gyn and neurosurgery, they are no more immune to being infiltrated by the less than capable than any other speciality,as incompetance and limited ability are not restricted to GP’s.
And yes you wouldn’t think so but “C” students are commonly admitted and graduated from medical school these days with a “C” average and have been for over a decade and if you track the rise in malpractice suits and correlate it with these goals practices, youll find a positive correlation.
As to “C” students making all the money, they may indeed, it is the most common grade acheived and has little to do with drive and ambition, and the ability to delegate or organize, as the common person is no less valuble to society than any other and it has been said that God must love the common man as he made so many of them, but if you call some one common theyll smack you, but regardless there no place in the upper echelons of the medical profession for them, you can NOT fill an alpha slot with a beta or gamma no matter how hard they work or there will be massive and far reaching implications in the long run as we are seeing come to light now and in the recent past…
TAPayne
also, by the way, if you were to look at the financial prospectus of your availible insurers, you will most definately find that their increase in rates far outstrips their recovery of losses of profits due to any increase in damage payments, and that their profitability has increased due to this rather than decreased due to awards
Anonymous
“also, by the way, if you were to look at the financial prospectus of your availible insurers, you will most definately find that their increase in rates far outstrips their recovery of losses of profits”
Tha’s hard to evaluate, because so many of them have gotten out of the malpractice business because they find it’s more risky to insure doctors then to insure hurricane-prone states. You’re left with the few that do manage to be profitable. If that isn’t a telling sign of the mess you lawyers have created I don’t know what is.
TAPayne
stop licencing credentialed medical professionals who have no business in the level of the profession that they have been allowed to thrust themselves into and everything will return to normal,as to asking my friends i have a couple with whom i have discussed this with and they are of a like mind as to the real cause of these rate hikes, the other ones that i know are the ones i helped credential back in the 90′s by writing papers and tutoring directly towards the tests they were to take, if i knew then what i knew now there would be rather more than a couple less of these incompetents out there,i lament this and now having been treated by others of this ilk now pay for my sins with poorly done procedures and treatments that will signifigantly affect the remainder of my life so i am paid in full and thank you for your civil and informed reply anon [by the way whats with all the pseudonyms, anonymous i can somewhat understand as it takes time to log in or create and such and some havent the time if that is indeed the reason unless it is being used to simulate a pseudonym,but i dont understand pseudonyms at all,are your arguments so specious you cant attach your name or is it the personal attacks you dont want to be connected with? do you lament the suffering your mistake caused or just that you have to drive a C class mercedes instead of an S class because of it,or had to go to killington instead of aspen?let us in on your sins against society,what were you sued for?do you really want tort reform in your state to draw these less than adequate professionals flocking to your locale, maybe a child or grandchild or someone else dear will suffer for it in future, is that what you want?raped by lawyers? what about the patients, is your oath lip service?physician heal thyself first…..then critisize the ills you perceive in others….
CJD
“Tha’s hard to evaluate, because so many of them have gotten out of the malpractice business because they find it’s more risky to insure doctors then to insure hurricane-prone states. You’re left with the few that do manage to be profitable. If that isn’t a telling sign of the mess you lawyers have created I don’t know what is.”
It’s more a telling sign of your failure to understand the insurance market. Why is it that someone like Warren Buffet would have just purchased the nation’s largest med mal insurer if it’s so unprofitable?
Anonymous
“you cant attach your name or is it the personal attacks you dont want to be connected with?
!. Most of us physicians don’t use our real names because the lawyers will use our quotes in court if they can identify us in the processs of raping us.
do you lament the suffering your mistake caused or just that you have to drive a C class mercedes instead of an S class because of it,or had to go to killington instead of aspen?
2. I drive a beat-up Buick Regal. Docs generally aren’t flashy, at least where I’m from.
let us in on your sins against society,what were you sued for?”
3. I happened to be working in the ER when a woman came in who overdosed on Cocaine. I never even saw her. She died, the family is suing because mom couldn’t possibly be a crack whore.
TAPayne
” I finished near the top 9of my class) and I’ve been sued”
ah i see, beat up buick regal eh? so you work in a low end facility because you were near the top of your class?
and mom was a crack whore rather than a cocaine addict eh? shows what kind of healer you are.sure you arent out of the goals 2000 program?just paying lip service to your Hippacratic oath eh?
reread its translation from the ancient greek
“I swear by Apollo Physician and Asclepius and Hygieia and Panaceia and all the gods and goddesses, making them my witnesses, that I will fulfil according to my ability and judgment this oath and this covenant:
To hold him who has taught me this art as equal to my parents and to live my life in partnership with him, and if he is in need of money to give him a share of mine, and to regard his offspring as equal to my brothers in male lineage and to teach them this art – if they desire to learn it – without fee and covenant; to give a share of precepts and oral instruction and all the other learning to my sons and to the sons of him who has instructed me and to pupils who have signed the covenant and have taken an oath according to the medical law, but no one else.
I will apply dietetic measures for the benefit of the sick according to my ability and judgment; I will keep them from harm and injustice.
I will neither give a deadly drug to anybody who asked for it, nor will I make a suggestion to this effect. Similarly I will not give to a woman an abortive remedy. In purity and holiness I will guard my life and my art.
I will not use the knife, not even on sufferers from stone, but will withdraw in favor of such men as are engaged in this work.
Whatever houses I may visit, I will come for the benefit of the sick, remaining free of all intentional injustice, of all mischief and in particular of sexual relations with both female and male persons, be they free or slaves.
What I may see or hear in the course of the treatment or even outside of the treatment in regard to the life of men, which on no account one must spread abroad, I will keep to myself, holding such things shameful to be spoken about.
If I fulfil this oath and do not violate it, may it be granted to me to enjoy life and art, being honored with fame among all men for all time to come; if I transgress it and swear falsely, may the opposite of all this be my lot.”
pay particular attention to the final passage
Anonymous
I work in a low end facility because I like the patients more, I wouldn’t want to deal with demanding shitheads like you. What the hell does the Hippocratic oath have to do with the fact that i’m being unjustly sued for a patient I never even saw? BTW, the oath is optional and not even taken by all doctors. Besides, Hippocrates didn’t have to deal with the anal rape occurring in courts across the country, this has changed the rules of the game immensely. It’s us against them, too bad, I didn’t make the rules, I just try to survive despite them
TAPayne
ah a goals doctor, thought so;demanding patients?you mean patients who could expose your level of competance if they asked you a pertinent question?or do they just make you feel superior?who wrote your papers and held your hand thru testing and boards?MD’s of the ilk you appear to be are the ones who are the ruination of the ones who deserve their degrees and licenses and maybe if you’d been on the stick when she was brought in she’d be alive and you wouldnt be in it up to your neck
TAPayne
this is not what i posted for, i came to present a positive correlation i found in the data this is denoted in my first post, i didnt come to lambast anyone or cause grief, i am ashamed i allowed myself to be baited by lawyersux and do apologize to all concerned
Anonymous
“maybe if you’d been on the stick when she was brought in she’d be alive and you wouldnt be in it up to your neck”
Ah, a retrospecovist. Maybe if the judge who sentenced her for drug possession the last time she was busted had kept her in jail, she wouldn’t have been out in the street buying crack cocaine, so she would have survived by not using Crack. We don’t admit patients to the hospital to try to keep them off the crack pipe. You cannot force someone to not use drugs, and you cannot blame a doctor for a patients drug use (I mean you shouldnn’t be allowed to, in America you can blame physicians for any bad outcome.
Anonymous
” “C” students are commonly admitted and graduated from medical school these days with a “C” average and have been for over a decade and if you track the rise in malpractice suits and correlate it with these goals practices, youll find a positive correlation.”
Please do give peer-reviewed evidence to back up your assertion….we are waiting.
“as to asking my friends i have a couple with whom i have discussed this with and they are of a like mind as to the real cause of these rate hikes, the other ones that i know are the ones i helped credential back in the 90′s by writing papers and tutoring directly towards the tests they were to take, if i knew then what i knew now there would be rather more than a couple less of these incompetents out there,i lament this and now having been treated by others of this ilk now pay for my sins with poorly done procedures and treatments that will signifigantly affect the remainder of my life so i am paid in full and thank you for your civil and informed reply anon”
Yeah TAP your exam tutoring resulted in these guy’s being MD’s. Your exam tutoring gives you the right to judge medical students based on preparation for exams before residency. Please get over yourself. I have a little secret for you. Most of us learned how to be docs in RESIDENCY not medical school. Medical school gives you the tools only. You stike me as a frustrated wannabe bitter about those who went on. Don’t get me wrong I have all the respect for scientists (in fact I was a research scientist for a decade before switching to medicine). I just have no time for embittered wannabe’s. Stup up to the plate pal or shut up, you sound like a whiney little child.
TAPayne
oh…rip the shirt, how cliche’
Anonymous
Cliche? You mean worthless babble on your part correct?
Now where is that peer-reviewed evidence to back up your assertation TAP? I am still waiting. I guess you are just pulling numbers out of your a$$ wannabe.
Anonymous
Usually I just peruse these pages but reading these posts,I am ashamed to count you among my peers.But I suspect it is perhaps the same person trying to appear as many, so perhaps there is yet hope.
TAPayne
Take off your shoes and socks so you can count above 10, learn what standard deviation is and correlate the data for yourself, I dont have to prove anything to you ,I was just try to help in reporting what I found, so pull you malpractice ridden head out of your ass and open your eyes, I outta here
Anonymous
TAP:
You once again give NO evidence to support your statement. You tutor a couple of future docs (most likely in premed classes or the MCAT preparation) and that gives you a knowledge base to damn a whole profession’s training system? I probably know a little more about standard deviation than you do as I am a REAL doctor and before that a REAL scientist. The only one with his head up his ass is you. Go back to school wannabe.

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