Nader blasts doctors' walkout
dailyrecord.com
Weighing in on New Jersey's medical malpractice issue, consumer activist and former presidential candidate Ralph Nader called it a "gross abuse of medical ethics" for thousands of doctors protesting malpractice insurance costs to walk off the job last week.
"The doctors have had their day of press in New Jersey. They've had their day of ink. Now it's time for the other side," the 68-year-old consumer activist said by telephone from his Washington office.
Doctors who rallied in Trenton on Tuesday want a $250,000 cap on damages for pain and suffering, which are paid on top of awards for patients' medical bills and lost wages. Nader said an arbitrary limit would be unfair.
"To say, to a brain-damaged infant's parent, that you can only get $250,000 for a lifetime of pain and suffering is cruel beyond credulity," Nader said.
"There are insurance executives who make $250,000 every week, without any pain and suffering."
Several doctors promptly fired back at the legendary consumer activist. Dr. Robert Rigolosi, president of the Medical Society of New Jersey, blasted Nader as an uninformed "adversary of medicine."
Others noted that Nader, a lawyer, largely echoed the views of numerous trial advocacy organizations whose members depend on a steady stream of litigants and the possibility of high jury awards.
Ruth Schulze, president of the Bergen County Medical Society, said the threat of losing big in court was raising insurance rates for doctors to an unacceptable level.
"In the states that have caps, premiums have remained stable or risen incrementally at a rate appropriate to inflation," Schulze said. "We know the system is broken."
Nader maintained that sufficient safeguards against frivolous awards already exist.
"We have to always remind the public that trial lawyers don't cause injuries and don't make decisions," Nader said.
"The trial court judge can throw out a case (and) remit any award downward. Any jury verdict can be thrown out by the Appellate Division."
At Tuesday's rally, attended by approximately 4,000 physicians, state Sen. Joseph R. Vitale, D-Middlesex, outlined a proposal in which pain and suffering awards beyond $300,000 would be paid from a new catastrophic trust fund.
Money for the fund would come mainly from an annual surcharge on all health insurers of $2 to $3 for each person they cover, plus fees amounting to $15 per year for all New Jersey doctors and lawyers.
Assemblyman Richard Merkt, R-Mendham Township, said he supported a cap in some form, but he and other Republicans criticized the Vitale plan as weighted too heavily toward lawyers at the expense of residents who inevitably will help replenish the emergency fund.
"It makes sure that every trial attorney has a huge pile of money to go after that, in my view, would attract numerous suits whether they're meritorious or not," said Merkt, who serves as a corporate counsel, not a trial lawyer.
"It may give doctors a small pittance of relief, but the real guarantee is for lawyers."
Nader blamed manipulation by insurance companies and inadequate regulation of doctors for the crisis in New Jersey, which has many doctors threatening to pack up their shingles and leave the state.
"When the stock market drops and interest rates drop, the insurance companies' investments go down, so they have to raise premiums. So they take on the most prominent specialties, like obstetricians and gynecologists," Nader said.
"These doctors then say it's not us who's overcharging you, it's the verdicts," Nader said. "So (the insurance companies) turn the doctors around and have them face the Legislature. Then, when the press asks insurance companies, 'If there are caps (on pain and suffering damages), will you reduce premiums,' they won't say yes."
The American Medical Association considers New Jersey and 11 other states to be in a medical malpractice crisis. Last month, doctors in Florida, Mississippi and West Virginia temporarily ceased certain patient services.
Merkt said the crisis in New Jersey is real.
"As it stands right now, we could be a state without an obstetrician in a year," Merkt said.
"Unless we want a world in which all the doctors leave New Jersey, we need to adjust the system, to one where people are compensated for their losses but can't come into it like they're hitting the Big Game lottery."
Nader disagreed with critics who point to a rising number of lawsuits as a sign of problems in the system.
"Being sued," Nader said, "is part of accountability. It's part of responsibility." |
