Date and Time
May 7, 2003
1:30 PM - 3:00 PM

Availability
Open to the public
No RSVP required

Speaker
Farzad Soleimani

Ample evidence suggests that medical malpractice liability system fails to provide compensation to injured patients efficiently and equitably. Furthermore, this system does not provide deterrence to substandard levels of care effectively: it causes defensive medicine in most cases, whose costs are believed to outweigh any benefits malpractice liability system may contain. Hence, a new model for medical malpractice liability system is introduced. This model is regarded as a medical injury compensation scheme rather than a malpractice liability system; it focuses on compensating the injured patients instead of trying to blame the injury on a particular party. In this model, an avoidability criteria are used to determine eligibility for compensation. From these criteria, a set of compensable events are identified, which would accelerate the process of compensation and help to figure out the problems leading to such injuries. This model is a no-fault system for medical injury compensation, which would make malpractice insurance and court proceedings rather futile. The patients have the option of three step appeal process: court-ordered mediation, arbitration, and if all fails, still an option for litigation. It is estimated that less than 5% of cases would end up in courts. The cost savings attained in this approach allow for more patients to be compensated and in a shorter period of time. This system of medical injury compensation, however, needs to be incorporated into an internal market, in order to fulfill the deterrence requirement of a liability system.