American Justice Partnership

Speaker's Resource: 4. Healthcare Crisis, p 4

 

 

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Key Reference Citations (KRC)

 

The Impact of Legal Reform

  • “The success experienced by those states that have adopted reforms, [such as capping non-economic damages, informing the jury if a plaintiff also has another source of payment for the injury such as health insurance] shows that these reforms could reduce malpractice premiums 34 percent. The savings to the federal government resulting from reduced malpractice premiums would be $1.68 billion”. (KRC:  HHS Report, "Confronting ...", p. 19, citing analysis from the Council of Economic Advisors, July 2002.)

  • “Doctors had to pay a whopping $6 billion in medical liability premiums in 2001, with premiums increasing in 2002 by more than 20 percent on average and by more than 75 percent for specialties in some states. Health care providers in states without reasonable limits on non-economic damages have experienced the largest increases, between 36 percent and 113 percent in 2002 alone.” (The White House, January 2003)

  • “The leading study estimates that limiting unreasonable awards for non-economic damages could reduce health care costs by 5-9% without adversely affecting quality of care.28 This would save $60-108 billion in health care costs each year. These savings would lower the cost of health insurance and permit an additional 2.4-4.3 million Americans to obtain insurance.”  (KRC:  HHS Report, "Confronting ...", p. 7)

  • “If reasonable limits were placed on non-economic damages to reduce defensive medicine, it would reduce the amount of taxpayers ’money the Federal Government spends by $25.3-44.3 billion per year. This is a very significant amount. It would more than fund a prescription drug benefit for Medicare beneficiaries and help uninsured Americans obtain coverage through a refundable health credit.” (KRC:  HHS Report, "Confronting ...", p. 7)

  • "As a result of California’s reforms, claims are settled 33 percent faster there than the rest of the nation, and injured patients in California take home significantly higher percentages of their awards." (Richard E. Anderson, M.D.,  The Doctors Company for the Physician Insurers Association of America, July 17, 2002.)

 

Medical Liability Reform - NOW!

A compendium of facts supporting medical liability reform

and debunking arguments against reform.

 

The American Medical Association has compiled a 72-page compendium that provides a more comprehensive resource on the subject of medical liability and healthcare than does this Speaker's Resource.  If you need additional information, this is the place to start.

 

The report includes a very useful state-by-state review of liability statutes (though not complete) as well as an 11-page index at the back of the report.

 

Download the June 14, 2005 Edition PDF

 

The AMA periodically updates this report and you can possibly download a more recent version using this link.  As of August 16, 2005, the June 14th edition is the most current.

 

Link to the AMA Website for Current Edition

 

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Please Note:  The material presented in this Speaker's Resource has been collected from a wide variety of sources.  You are welcome to use this material for quotations and factual material in your speeches, presentations and articles.  To the best of our ability, we have provided original citations so that you can document the comments you use.  If you become aware that any of the citations or facts presented in this collection are inaccurate or outdated by newer information, please send an email to Speakers@lawexec.com to tell us so that we can update this material.  The materials cited are generally copyrighted by the original author and when you quote from their material, you should include the original attribution to acknowledge their role as authors.  Original material © 2005 American Justice Partnership.