No worries, we all make mistakes.

“The hospital in the case I described was self-insured; there was no insurance policy or insurance company writing the checks.”

So the hospital determined it makes more money investing or otherwise utilizing premium dollars it would be given to a third party. At the end of the day, the hospital has put itself in the risk business. I’m not sure why I should feel sorry for them? Do they offer to pay the attorneys fees and costs of people who they make file suit instead of promptly paying on legit claims? Of course not. Where is the outrage over that?

“Over the past 25 years, I’ve always had some uninsured docs in my active caseload, constituting 5-30% of my docket at any given time.”

Likewise with an uninsured person. Do we chastise them if they can’t pay a judgment on a legit case? If you make a financial choice not to purchase insurance, I have no problem with that. But you’ve put yourself in the risk business, then. You are taking the risk that you’ll pay certain fees out of pocket even in a case you win, and the public who deals with you is taking the risk you will be able to cover your damages. You guys want to cry about what the uninsured doctor pays on cases he wins, but what about when he justifiably loses and can’t pay the injured party?

“It still has to come from somewhere, and one of the main places it comes from is the doctors’ premiums.”

Actually, most property and casualty insurance is written at a loss when you consider premium income v. admin costs and payouts. The money is made on the float. That’s what affects premiums.

Your comment to the effect that Defendants don’t pay for their defense is no more accurate than your initial generalization about no cases like this existing. The hospital in the case I described was self-insured; there was no insurance policy or insurance company writing the checks. Even when my client is an individual doctor, there is a modest chance he’s hitting the hip personally. Over the past 25 years, I’ve always had some uninsured docs in my active caseload, constituting 5-30% of my docket at any given time.

The money for defense doesn’t rain down like manna from Heaven, even when there’s an insurance company paying the bills. It still has to come from somewhere, and one of the main places it comes from is the doctors’ premiums. I agree with your oft-repeated point that, when indemnity payouts and defense costs drop, premiums don’t drop by the nearly the same percentage, but that doesn’t mean that being sued imposes no cost on Defendants.

The thing is, even if you’d found 1000 in the last 40 years, or 1000 per year for the last 40 years, when you consider that by WhiteCoat’s estimation there are a billion physician-patient interactions each year, you’re still talking an “infinitesimal” number of claims percentage wise.

Again, read what I wrote, not what you think I wrote.

You have a tendency to make up things about what I post, or maybe just misstate them. But if you feel the tone of my posts are “gloating”, I’ll be glad to be more polite. Of course, I’ll expect the same from you.

If I wrongly accused you of lying, my apologies.

And again, I freely admit I was wrong. But it is nice to see you for once acknowledge (however vaguely) that every once in awhile I do “disprove” one of your claims. I’ve never seen that from you or WC for that matter. WC usually just doesn’t reply and moves on.

If both sides would be more willing to acknowledge a mistake, perhaps we would have a more constructive dialogue. Although at the end of the day, all our dialogue doesn’t really change the fact that caps are the centerpiece of tort “reform” and that single payer will likely make it all moot. We’d have to spend some money to change that, and jabbering on the Internet is so much cheaper!

Given that the case would not be controlling in other states but the one it came from, I doubt it would be familiar to many lawyers who were not practicing there.

“But as you said “I never mind a little education if you can show me the docs”, I’m happy to be of service. ”

And I sincerely thank you for it.

“. So many cases are filed and decided for every case that goes forward for appeal. These appellate cases are used to put forward the theories on which cases are based, correct? ”

No, it’s not a choice at the state court level like the Supreme Court. State appellate courts hear whatever is brought before them. The appellate decisions consider the trial court’s judge and determine if the law was correctly applied to the facts.

“But from this we are supposed to believe no claims like this are ever filed or decided against the physician? When the court all but said they disagreed with the jury’s decision but upheld their right to make that decision…”

I don’t think they did say the jury was wrong. Appellate courts typically defer to the fact finder. And I don’t think you should believe claims like this aren’t ever filed. Clearly they are, and I was incorrect.

” Since you always gripe that physicians do things that have no hope of reducing our liability, how should we, in your opinion, reduce our exposure to these contributory negligence cases?”

You misstated my “gripe”. My statement was that you claim to do all these things “defensively”, and you say we should get rid of juries because you have to act defensively. But you have no idea if your defense works. So why should we change the law, typically to allow caps on legit cases, when there’s no evidence 1) that what you’re doing makes sense, and 2) that you do less of it when you get the reform you ask for. Given that you apparently misunderstood what I said, perhaps that will clear it up.

As to the rest of your question, do you mean the filing or the exposure to your insurer possibly paying via settlement or judgment?

Perhaps you didn’t read closely. I didn’t move the goalposts at all. I certainly didn’t say it didn’t “count” nor was it something I “didn’t want to hear”. I asked for the info and I thanked him for the cite and noted we now have one. It appears we may be up to 10 cases.

I don’t think that’s an excellent reason for caps, though. Which is the point of all these “horror” stories, anyway. We may all agree that some cases shouldn’t be filed. In fact I’m sure we do. I just don’t know why capping the damages of cases where the jury DID find malpractice is the solution.

“you said it didn’t count because defendants won (who cares what they spent to prepare, try and appeal the case) and anyway it was a long time ago. ”

Actually, the DEFENDANTS didn’t spend that money. Their insurer, who insures just this type of risk, spent that money. But I most certainly did not say it did not count. I said the system worked in that it took a claim, considered the evidence and reached a decision I presume you believe is correct. Again, no system will preemptively stop claims BEFORE they are filed. If you think so, you’ve watched Minority Report too much.

You should read what I actually wrote. It’s much more interesting than what you think I wrote.

Now do us a favor would you. Since you always gripe that physicians do things that have no hope of reducing our liability, how should we, in your opinion, reduce our exposure to these contributory negligence cases?

Way to move the goalposts, Matt. First you said no doctor could point to a single case resulting from a patient giving a “wrong” address and that there is no evidence that this has ever happened. When an appellate case was cited, you said it didn’t count because defendants won (who cares what they spent to prepare, try and appeal the case) and anyway it was a long time ago. When other commenters then described litigation in their experience arising from false information given by patients, you refuse to believe their accounts because their stories are “apochryphal” (euphemism for lies). My case did not result in an appellate decision, so it does not appear in any official reporter. Even if I gave you the name and case number, the county court where the case was filed did not put its dockets on line until after our case concluded, so you’d have difficulty confirming it. Thus you will no doubt feel justified in dismissing me as another of those apochryph-ers who tell you things you don’t want to hear. But the fact that you dislike and disparage the evidence doesn’t prove that “there is no evidence this has ever happened.”