by Mavis Mathews
(conservative)
Saturday, February 12, 2011
Nowhere is it written that you have to go to a doctor. It's never been mandatory as far as I know; it's a choice that we make. People have lived to a ripe old age who have never been in a doctor's office. I have to admit that for me, life would have ended at 30, at 50, and again at 76 except for a doctor's intervention and immediate surgery.
But, because it is always my choice to go to a doctor in the first place, I wonder why I have the right to sue the doctor should he/she do a less than perfect job? Law suits are, after all, at the root of today's exhorbitant medical costs. I knew a Japanese gardener who was married to a doctor. His entire earnings for all that hard work barely paid his wife's malpractice insurance each month.
Maybe suing a doctor should be limited to getting a refund for the actual expenses incurred instead of expecting to "never have to work another day." Maybe it's time for us all to start living a little more responsibly, to stop mistreating our bodies on a daily basis and then looking to doctors to fix them.
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Posted By: Lawrence S. Miller
Date: 2011-02-12 15:38:10
I disagree with your main point, which seems to be that we should substitute our medical judgment for that of a trained physician.
Let me put the part I disagree with in a different context. Let’s say my son goes into an auto repair shop to get his break pads replaced, and he later has an accident because the repairman failed to tighten the lug nuts on his wheels sufficiently. I believe the repairman is responsible to pay for all damages resulting from the accident.
Now, let us say a man goes to a physician and it is determined his right leg must be amputated. Then the physician amputates the left leg by mistake, I believe the physician should be held liable and forced to pay full damages; including, pain-and-suffering, and punitive damages.
I fully agree, however, that the medical malpractice tort system is in need of substantial reform. Though I am unsure of all of its ramifications, the Texas model appears to be a good, workable, and agreeable solution to the problem.
There are other easier, far-reaching ways to implement the cost cutting of medical care in America. One way is require all personnel employed in full time, or substantially regular part-time, positions in a medical facility, be direct employees of that medical facility. That would take several layers of profit takers out of the medical treatment cost equation and reduce costs substantially.
Probably the main reason medical facilities prefer using the services of employ provider services now is to avoid liability for the services rendered by the employees working in their medical facilities.
My conclusion is that our medical costs are out of hand for many reasons, all having mainly to do with dodging direct liability and the tort system employed to address medical care malpractice.
I hope you don't mind me asking, but have you ever been a victim of malpractice?
Let me tell you a little story. I had a friend who was a US Marine. He was wounded three times in battle, defending his country in WWII. By the time I knew him he was in his late 70's. A hale man, still in good shape for his age, but troubled by problems with his knee, shattered by a German bullet in Caen.
This friend went to a doctor to discuss his options, and they decided to do a knee replacement. My friend lists out his medications, and his allergies, and trusts in the Lord.
The hospital, in a "mix-up" , not only replaced the wrong knee, but failed to give him the digitalis he required, and he suffered a mild heart attack in the hospital. When he was revived and in recovery and the doctors briefed him , the fact that they had operated on the wrong knee came out.
The surgeon not only told this veteran that "well, I just read the chart, not my problem" but when the insurance company denied all claims filed -- since it was the wrong knee -- had the audacity to bill my friend.
Perhaps you don't think , in situations like that, that we should have a legal recourse. Maybe before you write another article, you could condescend not to assume everyone who files a malpractice suit is a piece of slime, and should just live with whatever ruination has been done unto them by the incompetance of someone who ostensibly went through 12 years of training.
I have been in both places: the victim of malpractice, and the defendant in malpractice cases. The high cost of medical care is mostly NOT due to malpractice issues (and I totally agree with Lawrence Miller and Logical Premise on this.) The cause is government intervention and regulation.
Big government imposes regulation, third-party rules, and many other unnecessary restrictions on licensure, practice, etc., that raise costs.
Malpractice insurance SHOULD BE expensive. In the case of the Japanese gardener paying for his wife's malpractice insurance premiums, if she ever decides that her premiums are not worth it, she will give up her medical practice and become a gardener.
