Shades of what happened in Florida and 19 other states last year.

Physicians need to stand firm and unrelenting in their efforts to battle this malpractice curse.

Liberals, abetted by their fawning columnists of the same persuasion, have been spreading false information to make it appear the insurance companies are all behnid this crisis. What they don’t tell the public is an obscene tort system that has gone out of control, with most of those malpractice premiums going to the pockets of a few trial lawyers.

The failure to find a sensible solution will only aggravate a rapidly escalating problem. When that day comes when women can no longer find obstetricians to deliver their babies, when patients can no longer find access to high-risk specialists, it may be too late to salvage a system that has served the interests of America well.

We all know, of course, who the culprits are!

Get out of the Box, Docs

Of COURSE limits on noneconomic damages ‘works’. When favored corporations are protected from living up to their responsibilities it ALWAYS saves them money. Great, they can save up to buy a senator or a judge.
The ‘we-know-who-the-culprits-are’ argument smells like the ‘few-bad-apples’ argument.
As long as you allow bizniz to run medicine and healthcare, its purpose will be perverted towards the bottom line.
Fix the system – stop trying to bail a sinking ship.

if tort reform fails in Maryland, then what ?

what concrete action can physicians do to stop this non-sense.?

Ah, machi, if I’m living in innocence, you are living in ignorance.

You want to cap malpractice rates, fine. The reason there are any malpractice insurers in California at all is the cap, to the extent it is effective, was preceded by tort reform.

If you tried to cap insurance rates in states that don’t have tort reform, the insurance companies would disappear in a second.

I say IGNORANCE, once again, because, despite saying it again, and again, and again, and again………it doesn’t sink in, does it?

Large business entities ALREADY have tort reform. My states’ medical school and hospital limit their TOTAL liability, let alone the pain and suffering advocated in all tort reform proposals. Many other states do the same thing.

Big business insulates itself from malpractice exposure via ERISA. You want to get rid of that, fine, I’d LOVE to see ERISA eliminated. Or at least kept away from health insurance…..maybe there was some usefulness to that law when applied to retirement plans, as I recall, that was the original intent.

I am fully aware of business control of medicine, thank you very much. If you think it’s a good idea to have business in control of medicines, keep the status quo. The tort environment will kill off the independent physician, while big business entities and government will insulate themselves from liability. They will then offer the independent physicians shelter from the storm that government and business created in the first place.

Somehow, I wonder if forcing physicians into government employ is what you want after all.

Bill Frist’s holdings are of no concern to me. He put the holdings in a blind trust when he was elected, to stay away from any conflict-of-interest charges. Apparently that’s not good enough for you. Frankly, I don’t care if he owns HCA and affiliates and subsidiaries, has interest in those businesses, or has the proceeds of that business in trust. The idea remains valid.

Study after study after study may be found, and cited ad nauseam.

Do you even have the slightest interest in reading them?

(Frist has thirteen mil? Is that all? John Kerry could buy a six-pack of Frists)

It sure is weird how three-fourths of insurance companies providing malpractice insurance have done so in the last five years. In fact, 43% of physicians are now insured by physicians’ groups out of necessity, not by big business. In the worst places such as Las Vegas (where the medical school almost had to close because they couldn’t find insurance and the only trauma center in NV closed for two weeks for the same reason), the Miss. delta, and South Florida many can’t fine insurance at all. I wonder if the insurance cos were making TOO MUCH money?

What a crock.