keep hearing some people wanting tort reform, putting a cap on judgements in malpractice suits.
What amount should be set for a cap?
Would this cap include everything, meaning once the judgment is paid would that be the end of any more litigation?
There seems to be talk of doctors leaving practice, because their premiums are so high. I would guess, (just a guess) that an ob/gyn who are hit pretty hard pay about 100k - 150k per year. At the same time they see about 6 patients an hour at $ 100 a pop, lets say 7 hours a day, thats $ 21,000 per week, then say they work 48 wks per year, that is $ 1,080,000 not including births and other procedures that pay a lot more. looks like those premiums might not be so bad.
Would like to hear from someone with first hand knowledge, I do know they have other office costs. Although it doesn't look to bad for them
or am I mistaken?
cbmultip - very true in some states tort reform did lower cost, yet in Florida with tort reform in place they had the highest jump in malpractice premiums.
ez - You think they would hire all those people if they brought no value to the doctor. I guess the doctors time is too valuable to waste filling out forms. Easier to make $ 600 per hour and pay 5 office workers $ 20 per hour and still make $ 500 per hour..hmmmm.
Insurance companies seem to raise rates the most on malpractice insurance during bad economies.. Seems that rates are tied to the market more than actually awards by juries
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The ABA and whatever other trial lawyer unions out there will never let that happen.
cbmultiplechoice
Yet another GRAND thing about Texas...we have it and it has worked.
That's because the doctors in Florida S@%$ !!!! My dad died in a hospital in Florida because "it was the Holidays" and they didn't perform the gall bladder surgery that he was admitted for!!
Quan
I have heard that a hand full of states have done tort reform and the premiums in those states are just as high in other states.
I have to research it more though, but that is all I am hearing about this issue thus far.
ez80227
yeah, but you're missing the fact that they have to pay administrators, rent, buy supplies, medications, hire techs and labs, etc, out of that income.
as for reform, the current bills have no tort reform of any sort in them... this can easily be rtaced to the fact that the ABA is the biggest contributor to the dnc. this is the reason it failed under bush and the reason the libs still blame bush for not getting health care reform even tho it's their fault as well as the economy.
as for hiring 'all those other people', it's not just that. can you build and maintain an x-ray machine? it's a full time job doing labs, could the dr doo all the labs and see all the patients? yeah, i didn't think so...
Your Assistant
Tort reform is extremely unpopular with conservatives for they are for big business. The former leader of the DNC is Howard Dean and he is for it and has explained it will have no real impact on honest doctors. Now it will have effect on doctors that make money by keeping you sick. Now that is the truth, the only way to know the truth is to study for this yourself.
Tort reform will keep prices down and services up and doctors paid and the 35% margin of health insurance profits down, just like the oil companies, they have to be reigned in for if they are not capitalism in its purest sense is senseless greed and so therefore as we have seen with the banking system and the auto industry we need to regulate things.
If we had no regulation there would be no medicaire for grandma and we would not have to worry about the plug being pulled because there would not be a plug because she would already be dead.
Maxwell
Caps on judgements means malpractice insurance companies have to pay less money. That means they need to charges less for malpractice premiums, which means doctors need to make less to pay for their insurance, which means hospitals don't need to charge as much for procedures to cover the doctors salaries. Lower procedure costs mean lower costs for patients.
So the short version is yes, it can lower the costs
@YOUR ASSISTANT
No, it is NOT unpopular with conservatives. conservatives support it. BO refuses to put TORT reform on the table. What does that tell you about which group opposes TORT reform.
What are you basing your assumptions on? That "liberal" states like Texas Have TORT reform?
mopar Mike aka tea party mobster
Working out the details of a piece of tort reform legislation is not going to be accomplished in the small slot of time and space we have here, but an aggressive tort reform bill would indeed lower cost, if it was a aggressive serious effort. If you think not, I doubt you have all the facts regarding the breakdown of rising health care cost and why they are going through the roof. God bless.
jcpnum4green@att.net
We need to do something about the bogus law suits brought against doctors, companies, and other individuals. The fact that doctors will have the whole gambit of tests run for patients even if they don't need them, is because they don't want to get sued even if the statistics show a very low chance of anything being wrong. These extra costs are picked up and passed on to us. Many suits are often settled out of court, even if the person suing is totally wrong. Its not worth the costs of hiring a battery of attorney's to fight it off.
Loser pays law would halt this type of injustice.
pdooma
Miami Dade County, the minimum level of malpractice insurance per year is $ 250,000. If you'd like additional coverage it goes up from there.
You know OBGYNS are on call more than 7 hours a day, right? Babies don't exactly come just within office hours.
50% of an OBGYN's job is surgical in nature. C-sections, hysterectomies, etc.
$ 100 a pop might be what you have charged an insurance company, but you'll get a fraction of that in remittance.
You also have staff to pay including their benefits, technical equipment - sonograms, dopplers, etc. Overhead for office space, utilities, office supplies. You have to pay your call service, your medical supplies, for things like exam tables, computer programs, make sure you are HIPPA and JCHO compliant.
Considering 90% of doctors are sued at least once in their careers, most for things that are not in their control, the insurance is just one of the concerns.
TMW
A typical doctors office will taking about half to 3/4 of what you're guessing, so $ 500k to 750,000. They usually have 2 or 3 nurses/assistants, a receptionist, and a billing/bookkeeper. Their pay, plus the office space, equipment, supplies, and insurance significantly eats into the profits. The net that the doctor gets isn't nearly as high as you've guessed. It's still a good living once you paid off the student loans and build up a good clientel.
Malpractice insurance costs us about 10-15% extra for medical care. Then if you add in th extra tests that are just done to be sure, and avoid a lawsuit... the extra cost is probably more like 20-25%. You'll see some kooks toss out this BS cost of 1-1.5% which is total nonsense.
Orignal From: Tips: Tort reform, Bush tried it, some states have it, will it lower cost?
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