The effect of medical malpractice liability on error reporting
Health Law Week
October 14, 2005

David A. Hyman and Charles Silver discuss the argument that malpractice lawsuits hurt patients by causing healthcare providers to hide errors. They state that such an argument is interesting because it acknowledges that physicians are self-interested. Also, studies show that tort liability encourages tortfeasors to change their behavior, other factors force errors underground and tort "reform" will not increase the frequency of error reporting.

While the tort liability system is far from perfect, reforms should seek to find ways that liability has led to improvement in healthcare delivery and build on those effects.

Even though the American medical profession has norms regarding the provision of error-free healthcare, errors occur in the healthcare system at an unacceptable rate. Studies have found that over a million people suffer injuries as a result of medical treatments each year, and nearly 180,000 people die each year as a result of such injuries. In addition, unnecessary treatments impose direct and indirect costs on the healthcare system.

The enormous costs do not even include necessary treatments that were performed inefficiently. There are currently no measurements or requirements to determine the effectiveness of medical treatments and diagnostic tests.

As noted earlier, some argue that the tort liability system impedes quality improvement by discouraging error reporting. Provider organizations and the American Medical Association have made these claims when advancing political agendas against the tort liability system. Most academic commentators share the opinion that curtailing medical malpractice liability will result in more error reporting and higher quality healthcare.

For a copy of the complete article, contact CJRG.