According to the New England Journal of Medicine, one bad doctor can spoil the whole bunch.
In reviewing information from the National Practitioner Data Bank, the study concluded that 1% of doctors accounted for over 32% of all paid medical negligence claims. For those doctors with 3 or more paid claims, they had 3 times the risk of committing malpractice again as opposed to the collective pool of physicians. The risk of each specialty varies. For example, the risk of neurosurgeons committing malpractice is 4 times higher than the risk of psychiatrists.
The study concluded “Over a recent 10 year period, a small number of physicians with distinctive characteristics accounted for a disproportionately large number of paid malpractice claims.” In order to have a “paid” malpractice claim in Tennessee following the Tennessee Healthcare Liability Act, it is a valiant effort just to get the case to court. I have often said that if you want to be the type of trial lawyer that NEVER loses at trial, you need to be either a government prosecutor, or a medical malpractice defense lawyer. These cases are extremely difficult for the advanced lawyer and are routinely dismissed on extremely technical grounds.
How do you check to see if your physician is among those with one or more paid malpractice claims? Call my office and we will be happy to do that for you.
