Valley residents must join forces behind legislation to keep top doctors in area

EDITOR:
I am the president of the Mahoning County Medical Society and a surgeon in Youngstown. About two weeks ago I heard a radio show hosted by Dan Rivers of WKBN radio that addressed the current medical malpractice insurance crisis in Ohio. The guests included two prominent physicians from Trumbull County, Dr. Thomas Kaminsky and Dr. James Sudimack, Ohio Insurance Commissioner Ann Womer-Benjamin, and Atty. David Betras.
The physicians' message was an important one for the citizens of Trumbull, Mahoning and Columbiana counties to hear: Unless there is immediate relief from rising insurance costs, these costs will drive area physicians to leave the state, retire early or choose other careers. Some gynecologists are no longer delivering babies. Insurance companies will no longer sell doctors insurance polices if they continue to see patients in nursing homes. We have already lost at least six general surgeons, a vascular surgeon, a cardiothoracic surgeon and a young family physician in Youngstown. There will be more.
What's causing the rates to increase? To a certain degree, higher jury awards are a contributing factor. But there's an eve more important reason.
Betras stated that he wants to preserve a plaintiff's right to have his case, a meritorious case, heard by a jury, and have that jury award what is fair and what is reasonable. I have to agree with him on this point. If a patient has suffered an injury due to a negligent act, that patient should have the right to recover damages sufficient to cover the injury. The problem is that too many innocent physicians are being damaged in the process.
Patients often come to physicians with disastrous problems and poor prognoses. When the patient or family is dissatisfied with the outcome, there may be a thought to initiate a lawsuit despite the best efforts of all doctors involved. A single critically ill patient may require the services of (but not limited to) an internist, family physician, surgeon, infectious disease specialist, radiologist, anesthesiologist and others. All too often what happens is that the patient or family will bring a case to a lawyer seeking financial compensation. When the attorney files the suit, he will often sue any and all physicians who had any contact with the patient. The thought process, as far as I can tell, is to get the suit filed before the statue of limitations runs out. Only later will the attorney review the charts to choose which of these physicians, in his opinion, were allegedly negligent, dismissing the others from the case. There's no harm done if a physician is dismissed, right? This couldn't be further from the truth.
When a physician is named in a lawsuit, he notifies his insurance company, who in turn will request the hospital and office records. The case will be assigned to a defense attorney, who will review the case and prepare a defense, which includes procuring expert witnesses, preparing visual materials and participating in depositions. The average cost of this review a couple of years ago was $27,000 per physician per case. Let's say the lawyer sues 10 doctors, then after reviewing the facts of the case, can't find an expert of his own that will find any concrete negligence, and all 10 physicians are dismissed. He's generated a bill of $270,000 in reviews for the doctors' insurance companies.
If things continue as they have been, soon we will lose many of the outstanding physicians in this area who deliver our babies, operate or take care of our citizens as they grow older. To prevent this, the public can take the initiative by calling or writing their local state representatives demanding meaningful urgent legislation that will stop the nonmeritorious filings of cases against innocent physicians. I urge the public to do what is best for them in the long run. All the doctors are asking for is attorneys to have the decency to research a case before filing a suit.
MARC S. SAUNDERS, D.O., President, Mahoning County Medical Society
Youngstown