Medical Malpractice Lawsuit Payments Fall to Record Low: Report

According to a report from Public Citizen, the total number of medical malpractice lawsuit payments has fallen to a record low, accounting for only 0.6% of all healthcare costs in the United States. The consumer advocacy group is calling on Congress to put safety measures in place to reduce the number of preventable medical mistakes instead of enacting further limits on patients’ ability to pursue compensation.

The report, The 0.6 Percent Bogeyman, released earlier this month, indicates that medical malpractice payments have been trending downward for the past three years and are at their lowest levels since the government began tracking payments in 1990.

Public Citizen looked at medical malpractice payment data and patient safety estimates from the National Practitioner Data Bank, managed by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The group found that there were only 11,037 medical malpractice payments in 2008, more than 30% lower than the average number of payments from previous years. The report also found that the amounts paid were either the lowest or second lowest on record, depending on the method used to adjust for inflation.

Even when including all medical malpractice insurance premiums, the cost of medical malpractice liability accounted for only 0.6% of the total cost of national health care. Annual malpractice payments fell from $3.9 billion in 2006 to $3.6 billion in 2008.

Nearly all of the malpractice payments were found to provide compensation for the most serious cases of negligence, with only about three percent of medical malpractice payments going to lawsuits that could be considered “junk” or “frivolous” claims. In fact, the report indicates that 83% of medical malpractice payments in 2008 went toward injuries that resulted in brain damage, permanent life-long care requirements, permanent injuries or death.

“Any way you measure it, medical liability accounts for less than 1 percent of the country’s health care costs, and the vast majority of victims receive no compensation whatsoever,” said David Arkush, director of Public Citizen’s Congress Watch division. “These are people who died or were left with serious permanent injuries – out of work, with enormous medical costs for the rest of their lives – and they and their families are getting nothing from the doctors and hospitals responsible.”

Public Citizen concludes that Congress would be better focused on improving healthcare in the country, as opposed to limiting patient rights as part of the debate on health reform.

In a letter to Congress in late June, in association with several other consumer and government watchdog groups, Public Citizen urged lawmakers to reject all amendments to health care reform that would limit the ability of patients and families to seek compensation for medical negligence.

“Shielding negligent parties from accountability is no way to cut costs or provide quality care,” the letter states. “To the contrary, it is a recipe for increasing the nation’s epidemic of preventable errors, at enormous human and financial cost.”

The letter states that improving healthcare, decreasing the frequency of medical malpractice and negligence, would both save lives and decrease medical costs.