Medical Malpractice News Articles

August 14, 2004
Surgeons deficient in washing hands in hospitals, study finds
Many doctors fail to wash their hands when they should, and the worst offenders are those who work in operating rooms or emergency departments. Anesthesiologists were the least compliant, washing up only 23 percent of the times they should have. Surgeons, ranking second from the bottom, had only a 36 percent compliance record of practicing proper hand hygiene. Doctors in emergency medicine complied only 50 percent of the time, according to the report, which is published in this week's issue of the Annals of Internal Medicine.

Feb 8, 2004
Audits would drop malpractice Insurance hikes Audit inks a new med-mal Rx
TALLAHASSEE -- Could a little-known state office known for challenging utility rates be the cure for what ails Florida's medical malpractice rates? State auditors say yes. In a just-released review of medical malpractice insurance premiums in Florida, auditors say the Florida Office of Public Counsel should become involved in helping set those premium rates.

Feb 8, 2004
ECONOMY blamed for high malpractice rates in Wyoming
A study of medical malpractice insurance in Wyoming over the last 30 years
links ... It concludes that the legal system is not to blame for rising
premiums that

Feb. 7, 2004
Lawyers not the cause of higher malpratice rates
"A study of medical malpractice ... Conducted by Americans for Insurance
Reform, the report concludes that the legal system is not to blame for
rising medical malpractice rates...ECONOMY blamed for high malpractice rates"

Feb. 5, 2004
Doctors abandon patients for a day.
Despite the lack of evidence that 'tort reform' will lower premiums, 2,500 Richmond doctors abandon their patients for a day to march on legislature.

Feb 1, 2004
Large medical malpractice jury awards rare in Kentucky
"Kentucky juries seldom find doctors and hospitals negligent in court cases, and when they do, they don't often award large amounts for pain and suffering or punitive damages, a survey of jury verdicts shows.."

Jan. 31, 2004
John Edwards Medical Malpractice Trial Lawyer
"In 1985, a 31-year-old North Carolina lawyer named John Edwards stood before a jury and channeled the words of an unborn baby girl. Referring to an hour-by-hour record of a fetal heartbeat monitor, Mr. Edwards told the jury: "She said at 3, `I'm fine.' She said at 4, `I'm having a little trouble, but I'm doing O.K.' Five, she said, `I'm having problems.' At 5:30, she said, `I need out.' " But the obstetrician, he argued in an artful blend of science and passion, failed to heed the call. By waiting 90 more minutes to perform a breech delivery, rather than immediately performing a Caesarean section, Mr. Edwards said, the doctor permanently damaged the girl's brain..."

Jan. 28, 2004
Malpractice bill would require disclosure of medical errors
"It's been more than a year since his 31-year-old fiancée went to the hospital to deliver their third child and ended up with grave injuries, but Chris Mirisciotta says he still doesn't know exactly what happened. It took a lawsuit, more than 70 depositions and more than $200,000 worth of investigative work to find out that her anesthesiologist had a drug problem. His fiancée, Kim Jones, is now in a persistent vegetative state. Filing a lawsuit against the Richland hospital and the doctor was "the only way we found out what happened," Mirisciotta told a state Senate committee yesterday..."

Jan. 27, 2004
Bush-Backed Malpractice Caps Failed California Doctors
"Restrictions on medical malpractice victims' legal recovery, proposed today by President Bush to doctors in Arkansas who face skyrocketing malpractice premiums, will fail to lower physicians' rates nationally as they failed to lower rates in California, said the nonprofit, nonpartisan Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights (FTCR)"

Jan. 23, 2004
Kentucky citizens don't want lawsuit limits

Jan. 20, 2004
2 Doctors sue for malpractice
"When two St. Clair County doctors were so seriously injured after their surgeries that they could no longer practice medicine themselves, they filed medical malpractice suits.."

Jan 19, 2004
Michigan juries more tightfisted with awards in 2003
"The number of million-dollar verdicts awarded by Michigan juries declined last year, according to a legal trade magazine survey..."

Jan. 14, 2004
Botched appendectomy results in payout
"An out-of-court settlement has been reached in a malpractice case against a former DeWitt surgeon who accused of botching a teenager's appendectomy four years ago.Amy Sater, now 21, of Low Moor was left permanently disabled..."

Jan. 8, 2004
Dentist accused of fondling 5 patients
"Three Sussex County women claim in an 11-count lawsuit filed this week in Newton that an Andover Township dentist groped them in a sexual manner during office visits..."

Jan. 5, 2004
Malpractice Reform Must Focus on Reducing Patient Injury, Not Just Limiting Awards, Says the Commonwealth Fund
"Reducing medical injury is essential to solving the current medical malpractice crisis, and physicians must play an active role in developing and implementing systems to improve patient safety, according to an article published in the Jan. 6 issue of Annals of Internal Medicine..."

Jan. 5, 2004
Leading authority on health care Donald Berwick says our nation's world-class hospitals and doctors are delivering health care that is unsafe and unreliable
"The revolutionary -
Donald Berwick says our nation's world-class hospitals and doctors are delivering health care that is unsafe and unreliable. But his call to dismantle the system makes the medical establishment uneasy -- especially since he used to be part of it...."