Report debunks right wing propaganda that high health costs are being caused by malpractice suits

[ck4829]

Americans for Insurance Reform (AIR), a special project of the Center for Justice & Democracy (CJ&D), released a major new study today that (among other things) debunks the myth that insurance premium increases for doctors are somehow driven by whether or not a state limits patients’ rights, or that limiting injured patients’ access to the courthouse would have any real effect on overall health costs.

AIR’s report, True Risk: Medical Liability, Malpractice Insurance and Health Care, was written by CJ&D’s Gillian Cassell-Stiga and Joanne Doroshow, and actuary J. Robert Hunter, who is Director of Insurance of the Consumer Federation of America (CFA), former Commissioner of Insurance for the State of Texas, and former Federal Insurance Administrator under Presidents Carter and Ford.

According to Hunter, “If Congress completely eliminated every single medical malpractice lawsuit…overall health care costs would hardly change, but the costs of medical error and hospital induced injury would remain and someone else would have to pay.”

Here are the major findings:

• Medical malpractice premiums, inflation-adjusted, are nearly the lowest they have been in over 30 years.

• Medical malpractice claims, inflation-adjusted, are dropping significantly, down 45 percent since 2000.

• Medical malpractice premiums are less than one-half of one percent of the country’s overall health care costs; medical malpractice claims are a mere one-fifth of one percent of health care costs. In over 30 years, premiums and claims have never been greater than 1% of our nation’s health care costs.

• Medical malpractice insurer profits are higher than the rest of the property casualty industry, which has been remarkably profitable over the last five years.

• The periodic premium spikes that doctors experience, as they did from 2002 until 2005, are not related to claims but to the economic cycle of insurers and to drops in investment income.

• Many states that have resisted enacting severe restrictions on injured patients’ legal rights experienced rate changes (i.e., premium increases or decreases for doctors) similar to those states that enacted severe restrictions on patients’ rights, i.e., there is no correlation between “tort reform” and insurance rates for doctors.

http://www.thepoptort.com/2009/07/new-study-by-air.html

[niceypoo]

1. The GOP health care plan

Has always been take away the publics right to sue corporations.

[bobbolink]

2. Both Ed Schultz and Thom Hartmann have been saying this.

Unfortunately, what they're not adding is that with our system, patients often have to sue as the ONLY way to get the health care they need!

If we had single payer, people wouldn't have to sue to correct mistakes, etc.

[sharesunited]

3. It's a mistake not to embrace tort reform as a component of health care finance reform.

The skill of the trial attorney and the sympathy of the jury are variables which are detrimental to the goal of standardizing risks and costs.

[rvablue]

4. +1 And a lot of good doctors have been run out of business due to insurance costs

themselves.

The skyrocketing cost of malpractice insurance is driving up the costs of health care, too. It's not just the patients who are being taken for a ride by health care corporations.

[customerserviceguy]

6. What if we had a "public option" for malpractice insurance?

And if we had an arbitration option for that? If I want to go to a doctor who uses US Government Malpractice Insurance Company, and signed a form that says that any malpractice claim I have against him/her will be handled by something like a Worker's Comp board, with the results to be made public on a website, maybe I could skip having a co-pay or deductible.

A trip to the doctor should not be looked at as a potential lottery ticket. And there are too many attorneys out there right now who see it that way. I'd like to avoid cluttering up the courts, waiting years for justice, and then having to sign a gag order when I finally do settle with a physician who might have unintentionally have done something wrong.

[rvablue]

8. This is a great idea. Today might not be the best timing, but you should do an OP on this! n/t

[no limit]

9. But the study found that in fact malpractice insurance is not driving up the costs

if it is its less than 1% of the total cost.

[NNN0LHI]

11. I have an uncle who is an OB who was "run out of the business." He got greedy

He was a great doctor. He delivered both of my children. But as he got older he didn't want to retire. Even after he knew his judgement was deteriorating. The money was too good to retire so he kept practicing until he had a few malpractice suits against him.

He should have retired before his judgment failed him from age.

Don

[DefenseLawyer]

10. Malpractice insurance rates rise and fall with the stock market

much more than with the number of lawsuits. Insyrance companies make their real money by taking the premiums and investing them. If you go back and look, the average insurance rates rise most when the market goes down.

[Echo In Light]

5. Unfortunately this nefarious meme has really taken root within the public mind

Rec'd

[crickets]

7. Great info. Thank you. K&R -nt

[starroute]

12. "Tort reform" was Karl Rove's baby

He didn't invent it, but he picked up on it early -- by about 1994 -- and ran with it for all it was worth.

He found that big corporations loved it -- particularly tobacco, trucking, and insurance firms -- and that it could be spun in a way to drawn in voters as well. More deregulation leads to more claims by injured consumers, and that leads to more corporate pressure for even more limits on injury lawsuits.

So the next time you get an urge to say anything good about "tort reform," just take a deep breath and say, "I am the victim of brainwashing by Karl Rove," and the urge will pass.

[ihavenobias]

13. K & R (#10). n/t

[TexasObserver]

14. Recommended. I've told people this repeatedly.

Even here on DU, we have people who repeat the old rightwing meme: IT'S THE MALPRACTICE CLAIMS!

No, it's not. It never has been. That's always been a lie, and it's always been used by the insurance/medical industry to lobby for more and more unfair provisions in the law.

[mnhtnbb]

15. I've seen the data elsewhere that premiums and claims amount to half of one percent

of health care costs (from the CBO). Glad to see a new report. Sending the link to a former co-worker
who has been yakking about malpractice costs. If she'd turn off Faux News, she might learn something.

[LiberalAndProud]

16. The GOP -- all they have left are lies.

No ideas. No honor. Not even patriotism.

Just LIES. and more LIES. And digging in with both heels while shouting, "SLOW DOWN YOU'RE MOVING TO FAST!" I almost feel sorry for them, but then I consider who is responsible for the hole they find themselves in and I stop feeling bad.

[mnhtnbb]

17. Bushie boy was pushing this in 2004. More Repub lies & BS exposed.

http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/01/16/bush.malpractice/