10 Jan 2005 Malpractice Crisis is Real

This USA Today editorial says:

Chris Heffner, a neurosurgeon in southern Illinois, stopped treating head-trauma patients when his annual malpractice insurance premium doubled to $265,000. With only two neurosurgeons in the area, brain-trauma victims now have to be airlifted to St. Louis…

The malpractice crisis is real, though concentrated in high-risk specialties. One in seven obstetricians/gynecologists have stopped delivering babies, and three-quarters have been sued at least once, a 2003 survey found. Physicians have faced double-digit-plus premium increases for years.

We all pay for this broken system. High premiums force physicians and hospitals to raise fees. Doctors engage in defensive medicine, performing unnecessary tests that might protect them in a lawsuit. That costs at least $60 billion a year, notes the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. And patients can have a harder time getting care, even in urgent circumstances.

Reform measures passed the House of Representatives last year but failed in the Senate. It’s an uphill battle as trial lawyers allied with Democrats duel the insurance and medical industries, which favor Republicans…