Posted on 05/10/2006 9:25:32 PM PDT by CheyennePress
Senate Democrats on Monday blocked the latest Republican attempts to limit damages for pain and suffering in medical malpractice lawsuits.
Republicans offered two versions of the bill, one applying to all malpractice cases and the other limited to obstetrics and gynecology, an area with high malpractice insurance costs.
Both bills failed to garner the 60 votes necessary in the 100-member Senate to advance to a full debate. The vote was 48-42 on the broader bill and 49-44 on the obstetrics and gynecology bill, largely along party lines.
President George W. Bush and his Republican allies have been trying to pass limits on malpractice damages for years, contending that frivolous lawsuits are driving up the cost of care.
...
"Medical malpractice liability premiums have skyrocketed and they are poisoning the practice of medicine," said Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, a Tennessee Republican who is also a physician.
Republicans modified the bills to allow damages of up to $750,000 -- although no single doctor or hospital would have to pay more than $250,000. People could still recover economic damages such as lost wages and medical care.
Legislation with a $250,000 cap has passed the House of Representatives repeatedly but has been blocked in the Senate.
Most Democrats and a few Republicans oppose the caps, at least at the federal level. Many states already have imposed lawsuit limits as well as insurance market reforms. Opponents of caps say they will protect insurers profits, not necessarily doctors or patients who have been harmed.
Democrats opposed to the legislation argued that rising premiums were due more to insurance industry stock market losses than lawsuits and were more a product of election-year politics than a serious legislative effort.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
*An obstetrician in Los Angeles pays, at most, around $69,000 for liability coverage. *In Miami / Dade County, Florida – which lacks comprehensive liability reforms – an obstetrician pays as much as $269,000.
Example:
The American Medical Association dropped Texas from its list of states in medical liability crisis (Houston Chronicle, 5/17/05). Malpractice claims are down and physician recruitment and retention are up, particularly in high risk specialties (Houston Chronicle, 5/17/05).
The five largest Texas insurers cut rates, which will save doctors about $50 million, according to the AMA (Houston Chronicle, 5/17/05).
Malpractice lawsuits in Harris County have dropped to about half of what they were in 2001 and 2002. There were 204 cases filed in 2004, compared with 441 in 2001 and 550 in 2002. There were 1,154 lawsuits filed in 2003, attributed to attorneys trying to file before the new law took effect (Houston Chronicle, 5/17/05).
Harris County has seen a net gain of 689 physicians, an 8.4 percent increase, according to the Texas State Board of Medical Examiners (Houston Chronicle, 5/17/05).
Texas Medical Liability Trust, the state's largest liability carrier, reduced its premiums by 17 percent (Houston Chronicle, 5/17/05).
Fifteen new insurance companies have entered the Texas market (Associated Press, 2/16/05).
Health Care Indemnity, the state's largest carrier for hospitals, cut rates by 15 percent in 2004 (Associated Press, 2/16/05).
American Physicians Insurance Exchange and The Doctor's Company also reduced premiums (Associated Press, 2/16/05).
The American Physicians Insurance Exchange saw a $3.5 million reduction in premiums for Texas physicians in 2005. In addition, beginning May 1, 2005, 2,2000 of the 3,500 physicians insured by the company would see an average drop of 5 percent in their premiums (The Heartland Institute, 5/1/05).
Looks like the lawyers win again.
Dems are simply just clueless that they are the problem and not the solution
Time for the nuclear option! I am sick of the obstructionists. or maybe the leaders should start calling out the Dems by name like they do us. But Bush is too nice for that.
But then this is why the RATS are trying to run private medicine out of business.
Is there another filibuster on this bill? Do the DemonRats filibuster every bill?
The reall sick part is that we have 55 Republicans and we could only manage 49 votes even for OB-GYNs. They should have brought in some M.D.s to the Hill and held a press conference bemoaning the lack of Democratic support for the doctors which have to treat all of the illegal aliens flooding our public hospitals in every big city.
I think we need to "clean house" in the senate. Too many old fossils clogging up the works. They've been there so long, all they think about is each other and getting re-elected.
DemocRATS: The Party of Obstruction.....
See how your Senators voted.
http://www.protectpatientsnow.org/site/c.8oIDJLNnHlE/b.1543451/k.3B4/Congressional_Votes/apps/s/custom.asp?msource=supp&auid=1655988
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