In Gesture of Bipartisanship, President Obama to Discuss Medical Malpractice Reform Tonight

I didn't hear anything but one gratuitous statement on tort reform. If you look at the contrinbutions of the AAJ on my blog, and who it is the direct the buulk of their funds to, tort reform is a non-starter.

Just more Obama rhetoric versus reality.

Mike Haltman

GOP proposals on medical malpractice reform are and always have been insincere, immoral, even deadly. They all mis the point. This is because they do not address actual "malpractice" itself which cost lives. They merely target the fallout in terms of money costs from resulting lawsuits. A decade ago we leadned that medical malpractice is the THIRD leading cause of death in the U.S. (JAMA) (Vol 284, No 4, July 26th 2000). Nothing has changed since. Perhaps instead of capping the resulting lawsuits they could reduce actual malpractice and savings would follow. That would be a proposal we could actually "live" with. However, I would never expect GOP right-wing ideology to be distracted by facts.

talmag, it is not true that nothing the president does can satisfy me. I was glad to see him give credit to John McCain for a good idea. I was glad to see him talk about tort reform.

But let's be clear. The tort reform talk was the tiniest of bones. A pilot program? Really? Still, I do think it was a step in the right direction to acknowledge that it was a way to cut costs and improve services. I gave him credit for bringing it up even as I expressed disappointment that he was satisfied with so little in this regard, even as he admitted that it would be a money saving move.

You say he would accept more Republican suggestions if they would come to the table. I take issue with that idea, because while his words were, "My door is always open," his actions have been quite different. Yes, he has reached out to Olympia Snowe-- ONE republican senator. But he has not invited republican leaders to the white house to talk about what they would want in the bills. He has not sat down with Enzi or Coburn or Cantor, for example.

He made a point of having Democratic Senators who are not firmly in his camp yet to the White House today. He did not have a similar sit-down with Republicans like McCain, whose idea he praised last night, and other moderate Republicans (there are more moderate republican senators than moderate republican representatives, percentage wise, so he can find a number of centrists in the senate to work with, if he wants) So he can keep telling me he'll listen to good republican ideas, but I'm still waiting to see he give them the opportunity to share those with him.

Now Obama says he's going to study the issue. "I am directing my Secretary of Health and Human Services to move forward on this initiative today," he said.

That would be Secretary of Health and Human Services, Kathleen Sebelius, whose resume includes eight years as director of the Kansas TRIAL LAWYERS ASSOCIATION.

So Obama has chosen a former trial lawyer industry lobbyist to run tort reform.

Why are people so cynical about health care reform?

This is a joek. There is no way on Earth Democrats will entertain tort reform. There'll be a bunch of blather about it, and the network news sources will tell us that Obama is all for tort reform.

He will be lying, of course.

I guarantee nothing will come of it.

Moderate: I can see that nothing the president does can satisfy you or the republicans. He accepted two of the suggestions made by republicans and would maybe accept more if they came to the table. Unfortunately, we will never know because they won't work with him. They would rather see thousands of people without insurance than work with a president who is trying. Remember, he has to keep his party happy too and this is a fine line. I have been to Rep congressman Tom Price's office twice and was told they would not work with his plan. Their plan is more for the insurance companies than the general public. How insane have we become when politics is more important than making things happen. That is why so few things get accomplished...both parties are guilty.

In his speech tonight, the president shouldn’t forget tort reform.” (John Avlon of the Manhattan Institute, City Journal ). P.S. Maybe he was listening. In his speech tonight , Obama made a non-trivial gesture toward critics’ views on the subject, acknowledging that defensive medicine drives up costs and “prompting an eruption of applause from Republicans at Wednesday’s joint session of Congress.

Pete, Nephron, X, thanks for speaking up based on your own experiences. Tort reform is necessary to reduce health care costs.

Pete, I sympathize with your situation. I have friends who are ER doctors and I don't know how they do what you guys do. Keep up the good work.

I recently went to the ER with chest pains and an elevated BP that would not go down. I am a heart patient with multiple stents, so I knew the rules-- when in doubt, go to the ER. I had also had a thallium stress test within weeks of the visit and worked out in rehab the day before. An EKG showed no active heart attack, my BP finally began to subside and my chest pains went away. Still, they kept me for several more hours and not only did extensive blood work but sent me for a chest x-ray we all knew would not show heart failure. The visit cost my insurance company, and ultimately me, a lot of money and most of it was money spent on redundant and/or unneccessary tests "to be on the safe side." Translation-- to avoid a lawsuit. Defensive doctoring. We need to get a handle on it.

What did he mean by "my bill"? HR3200? If so, that speech was just more lies. If not, where's he hiding "his" bill? Hm?

Well, darn, listened to the speech and the bone he threw the republicans on tort reform was itsy-bitsy. A pilot program to test the idea? Nonsense. We're not pilot programming Democrat proposals, right?

So he didn't scare his lawyers buddies one bit with that little throw-away paragraph. Darn, I actually had my hopes raised.

As one of 55,000 Emergency Docs I can honestly say we are all paronoid we are going to miss the big one. Be it an MI in 25 yr old, spinal injury, Pulmonary emboli so on and so on. The more unusual the illness the bigger the reward for a law suit. So the hunt for a needle in a haystack will continue or on in million diagnosis to avoid the ambulance chasing attorneys. We as ED docs pay about 30,000 a year for malpractice. That is 1.65 BILLION wasted on insurance and attorneys. Give the money to to poor you idiots. How can we get tort reform with attorneys running congress. Its like asking hershey to tax chocolate.
Pete

Doctors that go "bare" tend to be office-based: it is impossible to get practice privileges at a real hospital without malpractice coverage.The amount of funds spent on defensive medicine is astronomical. Studies rarely if ever address those procedures done purely to CYA. Lung CT scans to rule out pulmonary emboli are a case in point. The procedure itself is about a grand a pop. Then you have to cover the complications of the procedure. All so that a doctor can show the lawyer that he met the standard of care-even though no studies have shown a cost-benefit advantage over doing nothing.

Doctors that go "bare" tend to be office-based: it is impossible to get practice privileges at a real hospital without malpractice coverage.The amount of funds spent on defensive medicine is astronomical. Studies rarely if ever address those procedures done purely to CYA. Lung CT scans to rule out pulmonary emboli are a case in point. The procedure itself is about a grand a pop. Then you have to cover the complications of the procedure. All so that a doctor can show the lawyer that he met the standard of care-even though no studies have shown a cost-benefit advantage over doing nothing.

More cheap talk from a liar.

I'm watching "So You Think You Can Dance" instead of "So You Think You Can Lie".

I'm glad to hear the president will address this important topic in his speech. That's bipartisanship I can get behind. I hope something comes of it.

Now if the president were to actually come out strongly in favor of malpractice reform that would cut down on defensive doctoring, in the name of cost savings, will some of the folks around here who have been making fun of the idea that it makes economic sense to do this change their tune? Or will they ridicule the president's logic as they have ridiculed mine? Time will tell.

Of course, that only matters if he actually carries through on malpractice/tort reform, rather than simply just tossing a few lines into the speech for appearance's sake. But I am optimistic.

We need to make an example of the 5% of doctors who cause the majority of injuries.

Until the politicians are ready to do something to bring some accountability to the medical profession, they can shut the #### up about tort reform.

***

I think this is where we always get hung up-- the tort reform folks just want to look at one side of the equation. Don't you think there's room for comprehensive medical malpractice reform that lowers malpractice, increases patient safety and addresses the frivolous lawsuit issues?

I do agree that malpractice accountability issues don't seem to be something the GOP has expressed great interest in, btw, and that's why it's difficult to reach any kind of meeting of the minds.

How is this partisan politics? it is the democrats that don't have the votes. What about the 44 democrats opposed to the bill? I think Obama knows it is more convenient to blame the minority party and point fingers.

"So NOW for Obama to get thru Health Care Reform he has to bargain for Republican votes. We're waiting....."
robertb | Sep 9, 2009 7:03:51 PM

Ah, the minority party acting like petulant fourth graders. Just like Democrats in the 90's - hang on, you mean Democrats actually negotiated in good faith with Republicans on Welfare Reform? Well what about the giveaway to the rich trillion dollar Bush tax cuts - you mean they were mature and worked with a disliked president to get it done? Well Democrats were filibustering all the time in the Senate - oh, the Republicans doubled the number of filibusters when they went into the minority and set new records every year since?

Huh. I guess it really is just the Republican party that acts like petulant fourth graders.

Cut them out and put it through the reconciliation process, just like Republican Presidents have done so many times in the past.

Posted by: Obamacrat for Palin | Sep 9, 2009 6:20:38 PM

Your name pretty much puts you out of the running in terms of intelligence.

The Bush hhs report Jake cites is highly political.

There is a greater likelihood of doctors withdrawing from practice due to increases in their office rents or payroll costs than due to increases in
malpractice insurance costs.

Physicians spend about 3.2 percent of their gross income on medical malpractice costs.

The average medical practice spends three times as much money persuing payment of bills from insurance companies and patients than they do on malpractice costs.