All Things in Moderation

Tort Reform – for discussion

9 Responses

1. 

   lmsinca, on June 21, 2012 at 12:09 pm said:

   Interesting Mark. Sounds like the only real effect was on patients inability to find a lawyer to take their case and the lowered cost of malpractice insurance. That is too bad but not unexpected to me. Another Republican dream is selling insurance across state lines. I have anecdotal evidence that won’t work either and when people mention “race to the bottom” they really mean it.

   No magic bullets reforming health care or lowering costs.

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2. 

   Mike, on June 21, 2012 at 12:37 pm said:

   Not surprising to me either. From the NEJM last year.

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3. 

   novahockey, on June 21, 2012 at 1:11 pm said:

   OT: i’m on a call right now and the topic is diversifying away from medicare fee-for-service. essentially stop or reduce the number of beneficiaries served in favor of another type — any type — of patient.

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4. 

   lmsinca, on June 21, 2012 at 1:37 pm said:

   The first thing I thought of nova was a “dead patient”…………….geeze I’ve been negative lately. I really need to find that happiness store………………lol

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5. 

   jnc4p, on June 21, 2012 at 1:52 pm said:

   “lmsinca, on June 21, 2012 at 1:37 pm said:

   The first thing I thought of nova was a “dead patient”…………….geeze I’ve been negative lately. I really need to find that happiness store………………lol”

   Perhaps a trip to Hawai’i?

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6. 

   ashot, on June 21, 2012 at 1:55 pm said:

   Doesn’t surprise me at all. The two groups that get any benefit are the insurers and doctors and even then it’s not that much of a benefit. You still have to ask at what cost did even those minor benefits come. There are certain types of malpractice cases that simply aren’t worth the effort even if the physician messed up.

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7. 

   lmsinca, on June 21, 2012 at 2:05 pm said:

   jnc

   That would probably do it, a quiet beach on Maui. I could use a vacation, that’s for sure. We don’t really get to do that around here much because the business suffers if we’re gone too long. We generally only get long weekends and even then our customers panic………………………..needy bastards that they are…………….

   Ash

   How are you? I always though tort reform was just a red herring during the health care debate but now we have proof that it doesn’t really lower health care costs and hasn’t done so in the 30 states that have reforms along these lines.

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8. 

   Dave!, on June 21, 2012 at 3:07 pm said:

   Without seeing and reading through the study, I can’t really provide an opinion on this. Even then, if one assumes that tort reform happened and everything else that impacts health care costs in Texas and the other 49 states stayed the same, then, yeah, I could agree with the conclusion. The problem is that things have not stood still since 2003. And there are A LOT of things that impact health care costs. Maybe the researchers did account for all the other variables that can affect health care costs. Maybe they didn’t. What would Texas look like now if it hadn’t been inacted? We will never know that. And since we won’t, it is hard to know if it is successful at lowering health care costs or not.

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9. 

   Geanie Tilley, on August 24, 2012 at 8:59 am said:

   Hi, I’m from Oklahoma. Our last Tort Reform o 2009, not only put some of the lowest caps on, but unless you have a class action suit, attorney fees are no longer recoverable from the losing side. And Tort Reform changes are a One Size Fits All, no deviation unless it’s a class action suit.
   I currently have a suit against the City of Broken Arrow, who in their lame efforts to divert flood waters from 2 newly developed areas, diverted massive amounts of flood waters to our property/home and repeatedly flooded us for 4 yeas until they installed a real storm drainage system in Jan of this year.
   Estimated cost of repairs is over $98,600. In June the City asked us to submit a pretrial settlement amount. We asked for the exact cost of the repairs. Our offer was rejected and the City stated their intent to take this to trail.
   The only reason they are selecting to go to trial is due to attorney fees no longer being recoverable, in this type of case. So we cannot hope to obtain an attorney on a contingency basis, and since we don’t have the estimated $25,000 to go to trial just lying around, we cannot go to trial. This will result in our case being dismissed, the City will be able to slither away unscathed and we will be left paying a mortgage on a $150,000 home which recently appraised for $20,000. And btw, my husband and I are nearing 60 years old.
   Tort Reform does not do as it was intended, or does it? It certainly does reduce costs to BIG BUSINESS, DOCTORS AND INSURANCE companies…. but it ties the hands of the hard working citizen who has a legitimate case.

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