Submitted by Jamie Grifo MD PhD, Dec 26, 2007 09:12

Mr Dinallo first needs to understand why there is a $500 million deficit in the state-regulated insurance pool, the Medical Malpractice Insurance Plan. He also needs to question if a broken system of civil litigation as a tool to improve the quality of medical care actually works and is cost effective. He also needs to understand that it is not doctors who pay for this system but every patient. Some estimates of the true cost of our litigation system (not the 1% the trial lawyers' claim) have been as high as 20-30% of the medical GNP. If those dollars were spent on health care instead of an unfair victim remuneration system just imagine how many more people could be cared for. Any politician looking to truly improve the value of dollars spent on health care needs to streamline the system with information technology, standardize insurance claim forms and completely overhaul a system where malpractice claims are dealt with in the civil court system. There needs to be a separate arbitration board where there are no overpaid expert witnesses, uneducated juries and lawyers receiving 30% contingency fees. We need a mechanism that remunerates victims fairly and not less then trial lawyers and insurance companies. The cost to implement the current system is staggering and makes health care unaffordable to the poor. It has never been demonstrated to improve the quality of medical care yet it clearly increases costs by rewarding defensive medicine. It creates an environment where doctors treat charts and not patients. It leads to much mindless regulation which does not improve medical care but rather creates paper trails for trial lawyers to use in court. Surcharges will not fix this system. If surcharges become the current quick fix why not take it out of the trial lawyers' pockets instead of the pockets of health care providers? This system is designed for them and by them--don't user fees apply here also?

Note: Comments are screened, and in some cases edited, before posting. We reserve the right to reject anything we find objectionable.