Phoenix Personal Injury Lawyer - Tort Reform

The Number of Uninsured Continues to Rise

Staff Writer — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 15:04:40 GMT

According to a recent article in the physician publication American Medical News, the number of Americans without health insurance has increased to forty-seven million people last year. By comparison, approximately thirty-eight million four hundred thousand Americans had no health insurance insurance in 2000. The American Medical News suggests that one of the reasons for such a large increase in the ranks of the uninsured concern employer benefit cutbacks:

"Overall, the picture is one of continual erosion of employer coverage that is now starting to squeeze the middle class," said Karen Davis, PhD, president of the Commonwealth Fund, a foundation dedicated to improving health care. "It's very troubling to see this dramatic increase."

Several reform suggestions advocated by the American Medical Association to use tax credits and vouchers to faciliate the purchase of health insurance sound promising. However, I cannot understand how uninsured or even insured consumers will benefit by other tort reform aspects of the American Medical Association advocacy agenda. I simply fail to see a coorelation between limitations on accountability for medical errors and access to health insurance and quality medical care.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Staff Writer

Recent Safety Recalls Highlight Continuing Fight for Accountability

Staff Writer — Tue, 21 Aug 2007 10:05:27 GMT

Have you heard about recent recalls of tainted pet food involving food safety? How about toy recalls involving possible lead paint exposure? Have you heard about even more toy recalls involving choking hazards for small children? How about laptop computer batteries recalled due to a fire hazards? After hearing about all of these recalls, do you believe that consumer products are safer or more dangerous today when compared to years past?

I hear two different perspectives about product safety. First, I hear that litigation risks have forced companies to voluntarily recall products which would not have been recalled in past years. I hear people argue that safety risks involving a small percentage of consumers should not form a basis for product recall decisions. Alternatively, I hear that consumer products are increasingly becoming more dangerous as manufacturers outsource product design and assembly to locations which do not prioritize product safety.

What do you think? Do you believe products are safer today than they were twenty years ago? Do you believe that the dangers have not changed but that companies simply disclose more information today than twenty years ago? Should information disclosure and product recalls continue or should we simply make our own decisions to buy products instead relying on sellers and manufacturers to design and manufacture them safely? Do you trust that product manufacturers and sellers in business to make a profit will always design and market safe products? When confronted with less costly yet less safe design alternatives, absent some form of accountability, will sellers and manufacturers always choose safety over the bottom line? I'd like to hear your thoughts.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Staff Writer

Michael Moore's Movie "Sicko" and Its Portrayal of US Healthcare

Staff Writer — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 09:00:00 GMT

Michael Moore released a new movie about the system of healthcare in the United States. In the movie, he portrays our healthcare system as one in crisis. Do you believe our healthcare system in this country provides the best quality of care to patients at a reasonable cost? Have you seen the movie Sicko? Do you think the movie accurately portrays problems with our healthcare system in America? Do you believe our healthcare system is in a crisis? I have not seen the movie but am interested in hearing from anybody who has.

According to press accounts, Moore presents stories about patients and their problems receiving quality healthcare. He also compares the healthcare system in the United States with systems in other countries and apparently advocates for a universal healthcare system in this country. Moore presents examples of patients who were evicted from their homes because they received costly medical services but could not afford to pay for the care. In another example, Moore presents a patient who, due to the overburdensome cost, had to choose between re-attachment of a severed index or ring finger but not both. In contrast, a Canadian patient using that country's healthcare system would have been able to have all of his severed fingers re-attached at no cost.

I understand that the movie seems to advocate eliminating health insurance companies altogether from our system of healthcare and instead, providing a single payor government run or administered system for everybody. I am not sure our country can look to mandatory government run healthcare as the catchall answer to the complex problems and questions about access to healthcare and quality of service. I always have concerns when people suggest our government can create a new large bureaucratic program and have this program deliver quality services to everybody at low or no cost. Look at the Veterans Administration as an example of how medical care could be administered to patients and taxpayers throughout the country. Can we honestly say that our military veterans who sacrifice so much for this country receive quality healthcare? Based upon recent news accounts about problems at Walter Reed Medical Center and other VA medical facilities across the country, I do not believe that our military veterans receive the highest quality of medical care. If our military veterans do not receive adequate and quality healthcare, how can we believe that our government can successfully administer a healthcare program for everybody? Also, even if our government can successfully create a new bureaucracy to oversee healthcare delivery, what will this program cost? Our budget deficit already requires massive government borrowing which crowds out private sector access to capital. We probably cannot create such a massive bureaucracy without increasing taxes. Perhaps we should consider new taxes or user fees if raising taxes could lead to a reasonable resolution of the problems we see in our healthcare system. I am just not convinced that a new government program is the answer.

Last year, the Massachusetts legislature passed a bill requiring health insurance for all citizens. According to the Washington Post,

The Massachusetts legislature approved a bill . . . that would require all residents to purchase health insurance or face legal penalties, which would make this the first state to tackle the problem of incomplete medical coverage by treating patients the same way it does cars.
Gov. Mitt Romney (R) supports the proposal, which would require all uninsured adults in the state to purchase some kind of insurance policy by July 1, 2007, or face a fine. Their choices would be expanded to include a range of new and inexpensive policies -- ranging from about $250 per month to nearly free -- from private insurers subsidized by the state.

This approach involves providing state subsidies for low income citizens; however, I do not know whether the legislation addresses problems associated with denial of coverage for pre-existing health conditions. The legislation took effect as of July 1 this year and presents one approach to addressing problems with the uninsured. Other health care policy study groups have been evaluating options and will likely present research in response to the Moore movie. Perhaps some of the suggestions in the Massachusetts model, the Rand Project, or other research initiatives can be looked upon and applied nationally if successful.

I commend Michael Moore for drawing our nation's attention to the problem with healthcare in America and plan to see the movie soon. I do not necessarily agree with his apparent suggested solution; however, at least he increased our awareness of healthcare problems. Hopefully policymakers can come up with creative solutions to improve the quality and cost of care.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Staff Writer

Frivolous Lawsuit Against Dryclear Dismissed

Staff Writer — Wed, 27 Jun 2007 10:00:00 GMT

In early May, I wrote about an example of a likely frivolous lawsuit. If you recall, the drycleaning business in that case lost a pair of pants and the Plaintiff originally demanded compensation totalling $65,000,000 even after the business compensated him for the lost pants. In my earlier posting, I suggested that our system of justice has legitimate safeguards to prevent frivolous litigation from moving forward indicating that:

I can only hope that we focus the same attention on this lawsuit when it gets dismissed so that we can confirm that our judicial system works.

Well just this week, the judge assigned to the case dismissed the frivolous lawsuit. The judge also directed the drycleaning business to submit briefs on the question of whether the plaintiff should face sanctions and attorney's fees to repay the defendants' litigation costs.

The judge reviewed the allegations in the lawsuit and made a reasoned decision to dismiss it and give serious consideration to sanctioning the Plaintiff for demanding such outrageous damages and proceeding forward with frivolous litigation.

If the evidence shows that a case is frivolous and should never have been filed, fortunately, the offending litigant can be sanctioned to prevent future frivolous conduct. The result in this case reinforces my opinion that our system of justice works and does not need wholesale changes. Plaintiffs who file frivolous cases should face sanctions but this drycleaner lawsuit does not mean that our judicial system faces a large number of frivolous lawsuits. In my opinion, frivolous drycleaner cases do not clog our courts. In fact, to the contrary, I believe that the overwhelming number of civil lawsuits in our court system today involves claims which have merit. Additionally, I believe that this drycleaner lawsuit presents an example of why our system of justice works. Do you believe differently?

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Staff Writer

The Tort Reform Debate

Staff Writer — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 12:00:01 GMT

I received a few responses to my recent posting about the California Medical Injury Compensation Reform Act (MICRA) which present different perspectives on an emotionally charged tort reform debate. Thank you to those who commented. Although we do not necessarily share the same opinions, I appreciate your willingness to post your thoughts and believe that we can respectfully disagree on some issues in this debate in as professional a manner as possible. Although some other reforms may be available to assist in improving the quality of care, I still believe that enough evidence in California exists to show that damage caps are not a successful tool to do so. The recent death of a victim waiting in an emergency room for treatment cannot be looked upon favorably as an example of quality health care in California. Clearly something went wrong in the hospital. I do not believe that limiting the damages which the decedent's family can recover will ever provide incentives for the hospital emergency department to change its patient safety systems.

We hear stories that doctors supposedly are being driven out of practice because they cannot afford malpractice insurance premiums. At the same time, we hear stories about insurance company profits reaching all-time highs. Patients seeking quality health care get caught somewhere in between both sides of this hotly contested debate. I believe that tort reform should focus on the goal of quality improvements and access to health care. I do not believe it should mean that injured victims must recover less than the total value of their damages when something goes wrong. If we examine some simple things the medical profession can do to improve care and reduce insurance premiums, doctors should not be driven from practice either.

In a prior posting about the malpractice debate in Arizona I relayed my thoughts on tort reform. In this posting, you will see a link which contains support for my suggestion that the California MICRA has not been effective in improving quality. According to some commentators,

California's caps did not help doctors--insurance reform did.
"California doctors' premiums increased by 450% in the first 13 years after the 1975 passage of MICRA and only began to decrease after voters enacted the insurance reform initiative known as Proposition 103." (Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights, "How Insurance Reform Lowered Doctor's Medical Malpractice Rates In California...And How Malpractice Caps Failed," March 2003, http://www.consumerwatchdog.org/malpractice/rp/1008.pdf
"While MICRA was the legislature's attempt at remedying the medical malpractice crisis in California in 1975, it did not substantially reduce the relative risk of medical malpractice insurance in California." (James Robertson, Assistant Vice President and Associate Actuary, SCIPIE Indemnity Company (California's second largest medical malpractice insurer), in written testimony responding to a question from an administrative law judge who is overseeing a case in which SCIPIE has requested a 15.6 % rate hike. April 30, 2003)

The debate over quality health care should not involve a dispute between lawyers and doctors. My thoughts on this issue are simple. I do not believe our government should tell a victim of a negligent care provider how much their injury should be worth. How does telling a victim how much a botched procedure is worth somehow improve the number of doctors in our profession or the quality of health care. Incidentally I also do not believe we should be telling insurance companies how much profit they should earn and how much malpractice premiums they should charge. During this debate about how supposedly doctors are leaving the profession in large numbers, I continue to hear stories about how insurance carriers are reporting record profits. If tort reform advocates are truly even-handed, shouldn't tort reform advocates support caps on insurance company profits?

I am not a fan of government intervention in the private sector. I do not believe government interference in the private sector creates an efficient market. I do not believe damage caps or caps on insurance company profit will lead to more doctors and a higher quality of care. I just believe that providers who cause patient injuries should be held accountable. As indicated in my prior posting,

Consumer advocates suggest that malpractice limits prevent patients who suffer egregious harm from recovering adequate compensation for real injuries. On the other side of the debate, physicians blame the justice system for escalating insurance premiums. It seems to me that doctors and patients should both agree that quality care should the be first and foremost priority and when somebody suffers harm due to the conduct of a care provider, that individual should be held accountable. It also seems to me that physicians should not have to pay skyrocketing health insurance premiums only to watch these insurance premiums lead to skyrocketing insurance company profits. Perhaps capping insurance company profits or placing some type of windfall profits tax on insurance companies in the context of this debate may actually lead to reduced malpractice premiums. From a pure economic perspective, government intervention into the private sector is inefficient, irrespective of whether this intervention is described as malpractice reform or a windfall profits tax on insurance carriers. If we can get away from advocating any type of government intervention by way of tort reform or a caps on insurance company profits, then we can look to other ways to control costs and promote quality care.

Using technology to control cost and improve health care quality can be a mutually acceptable tool to everyone in this hotly contested debate. Various commentators discussing tort reform suggest that simply embracing technology can enhance quality of care, prevent systematic breakdowns, and prevent the yearly deaths of an estimated 44,000 to 98,000 patients caused by medical errors as estimated in a 1999 study by the Institute of Medicine. Just today, an article in the legal technology section of the on line publication Law.Com suggested that the use of electronic prescriptions can minimize adverse drug events, save lives and lower costs of care:

HHS, in a recent report to Congress, cited expert projections that e-prescribing could avoid more than 2 million adverse drug events annually, 130,000 of which are life-threatening. Even so, five government-funded e-prescribing pilot projects did not establish the effect on patient safety, the report said, noting the role of office staff members in handling e-prescribing tasks. The effect on safety requires more study, the report said.

Perhaps other simple and non-controversial tools can also improve care. Concentrating on these tools and away from rhetoric will no doubt benefit everyone. Do you have other ideas about how to improve the quality of medical care which do not involve either tort or insurance reform?

For more information on this subject, please refer to our section on Medical Malpractice and Negligent Care.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Staff Writer

How Would Tort Reform Affect the Quality of Emergency Healthcare?

Staff Writer — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 07:00:00 GMT

In 1975, the California State Legislature passed the California Medical Injury Compensation Reform Act (MICRA) which placed a cap on damages for medical malpractice claims. According to this Act, an injured plaintiff cannot recover non-economic losses in excess of $250,000. This tort reform statute has been in effect in California for thirty-two years. Because this California law has been in effect for so long, perhaps we can look to this state to determine whether tort reform has been effective in improving the quality and price of medical care. In general, I believe private market conditions rather than government interference and regulation leads to higher quality and efficiency. This means that I do not believe that artificial caps on damages are effective in improving the quality and cost of medical care.

Today, I came across a shocking news story about the quality of emergency room care in at least one hospital in California. A patient who was bleeding from her mouth and crying out in pain while she was forced to wait more than forty-five minutes in the lobby of the emergency room at Martin Luther King Jr.-Harbor Hospital died because she did not receive timely emergency care. According to news accounts, family members tried to call 911 to receive timely medical care and transport the patient to another facility. Unfortunately, dispatchers refused to call paramedics after learning about her location. According to news accounts of the breakdown in patient care:

In the recordings of two 911 calls that day, first obtained by the Los Angeles Times under a California Public Records Act request, callers pleaded for help for Rodriguez but were referred to hospital staff instead.
"I'm in the emergency room. My wife is dying and the nurses don't want to help her out," Rodriguez's boyfriend, Jose Prado, is heard saying in Spanish through an interpreter on the tapes.
"What's wrong with her?" a female dispatcher asked.
"She's vomiting blood," Prado said.
"OK, and why aren't they helping her?" the dispatcher asked
'They're just watching her'
"They're watching her there and they're not doing anything. They're just watching her," Prado said.
The dispatcher told Prado to contact a doctor and then said paramedics wouldn't pick her up because she was already in a hospital. She later told him to contact county police officers at a security desk.

The patient died after suffering from a perforated bowel which according to the coroner, could have been surgically repaired if it had been caught in time. Clearly, the emergency medical care provided to this patient fell well below the standard of care required for emergency medical providers. In fact, according to press reports, the hospital had a history of patient safety problems. The federal government previously even warned this hospital about safety problems placing emergency room patients at immediate risk of harm. The hospital risked losing federal funding had it not improved patient safety.

What do caps on damages in medical malpractice litigation have to do with this California hospital? Perhaps nothing. However, I believe that possible litigation damage awards usually play a role in how people manage risks. Because risk management departments evaluate safety based upon exposure to damage awards, damage caps can play a role in the priorities placed on patient safety programs. Perhaps if this hospital placed more emphasis on patient safety, it would have had a more effective patient triage program in place rather than forcing a patient with a perforated bowel to wait in an emergency room lobby until she died.

I must admit that other than what has been reported in news stories, I know nothing about this hospital. However, I firmly believe that risk management departments place an increased emphasis on patient safety when facing an unlimited exposure to litigation risk . As a result, litigation can be an effective tool to promote safety. This hospital never faced a civil judgment beyond exposure to civil damages caps. Because such risks never existed in California, perhaps patients suffer from poor quality of care. Do you believe the hospital has adequate incentive to provide safe patient care? Do you believe that damage caps play a role in the safety decisions corporations and medical providers make? Would damage caps in California work in Arizona? Let me know your thoughts.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Staff Writer

Blue Cross of California Agrees to Settle Rescission Class Action Lawsuit

Staff Writer — Mon, 11 Jun 2007 11:00:00 GMT

Blue Cross of California recently entered a settlement agreement to resolve a class action lawsuit against the health insurer concerning the nature of its individual health insurance business practices. Blue Cross had been accused of using innocent mistakes on poorly worded insurance applications to rescind policies after insureds submitted costly claims. After concluding that it would lose money based on costly claims, the company allegedly undertook a campaign to find the slightest misrepresentations on the application for insurance and rescind the policy leaving individuals without coverage and with thousands of dollars in unpaid medical claims.

As a condition of the settlement, Blue Cross agreed to modify its health insurance application form to make it more readable and user friendly. Also, Blue Cross agreed to only rescind individual health insurance policies when policy applications contained intentional and wilful lies. In other words, insureds in California who make honest mistakes in an application for health insurance cannot have their policies taken away from them when they submit claims and need insurance the most.

According to the Los Angeles Times, Blue Cross of California agreed to a series of changes in business practices to help the consumer health insurance policy-holders:

The move is part of an effort to settle a class-action lawsuit on behalf of as many as 6,000 people canceled since late 2001. It is an about-face for Blue Cross in what had become known as "use-it-and-lose-it" health coverage because the cancellations were often triggered by patients' claims for treatment.
The insurer's new stance is aimed at ending rescissions based on policyholders' honest mistakes, inadvertent errors and other inconsistencies about their medical histories on applications for coverage. Consumers contend that the forms are purposely confusing, increasing the odds that applicants will make mistakes.
"This is a very significant consumer health victory ... something we believe they should have been following all along," said Cindy Ehnes, director of the state Department of Managed Health Care.
* * * *
"What we have tried to say to the plans is the process that you use to make those determinations is very flawed," Ehnes said. "First you go back way too far in someone's medical history. Most of us can't remember what we ate for dinner last night, much less what the doctor told us 20 years ago."
Among other changes, Blue Cross agreed to consult policyholders about application problems in deciding whether a rescission was justified.

An easier to read application makes it more difficult for an insurance carrier to claim rescission based upon poorly worded ambiguous application questions. Also, requiring the carrier to prove the consumer intentionally lied on the application before rescinding the insurance policy provides the consumer with protection for innocent yet incorrect application responses. Lastly, providing an appeals process after a policy has been taken away provides the consumer with an efficient tool to contest the company's decisions. All of these concessions negotiated in the context of a class action lawsuit against Blue Cross protect individual policy-holders and demonstrate the benefit of that litigation. I congratulate Plaintiffs' attorney William Shernoff, the California state Department of Managed Health Care and Blue Cross of California for their efforts.

I applaud Blue Cross of California's decision to change its conduct and hope that health-insurance companies in Arizona do the same thing. Hopefully Arizona health insurance providers will enact similar measures and abandon efforts to use innocent yet incorrect responses on poorly worded and confusing insurance applications as a basis to take away health insurance policies when consumers need protection the most.

Do you have an individual health insurance policy in Arizona? Have you had similar problems? What do you think about the settlement in California? Do you believe health insurance companies in Arizona should enact the same changes here?

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Staff Writer

Child Cancer Patients and Medication Errors

Staff Writer — Sun, 27 May 2007 09:00:36 GMT

As if struggling with and battling cancer is not enough, according to a researcher at Johns Hopkins Children Center, children often must also face the additional battle of having to overcome problems relating to medication errors.

Children with cancer often get the wrong dose of chemotherapy or are given the drug at the wrong time, and many require treatment because of the errors, U.S. researchers said on Friday.

Medication errors involving the improper administration of cancer medication present serious challenges as children struggle to cope with their illness. Usually the errors involve administration of chemotherapy designed to kill cancerous cells. When administered improperly, chemotherapy can kill good cells and cause further health problems.

The Johns Hopkins Childrens Center has already been on the cutting edge of research recommending methods to avoid clinical errors in the administration of chemotherapy to child cancer patients. As far back as 2003, Johns Hopkins has recommended a systematic approach using chemotherapy audits to minimize risk of harm administering chemotherapy. Researchers previously recommended checks and double checks prior to administrating chemotherapy to minimize risk of medication error.

If somebody's child suffered consequences as a result of a medication error, should the care provider be held accountable for the resulting problems? Various tort reform initiatives would reject this notion and not hold the wrongdoer accountable for damages resulting from the medication misadventure. Is this an example of fairness? Frivolous litigation? Accountability? Do you believe that tort reform initiatives are the answer to the problems created by errors in the administration of chemotherapy medication? Rather than advocating tort reform under these circumstances, perhaps safe medication administration practices could be the answer to problems resulting from medication errors. What do you think?

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Staff Writer

Pharmacutical Company Pleads Guilty to Fraud involving Marketing Drug OxyContin

Staff Writer — Mon, 21 May 2007 16:05:51 GMT

Recently Purdue Pharma, together with three company executives, agreed to plead guilty to misleading the public in its marketing approach for the narcotic drug OxyContin. The company also agreed to pay fines and other assessments totalling $600 million dollars in one of the largest criminal penalties ever assessed against a company. According to the New York Times, Purdue Pharma mislead the public into believing that because the narcotic drug OxyContin involved a time release formulation, it involved less risks of addiction than other narcotic drugs. OxyContin is a powerful pain narcotic which lasts up to twelve hours. The drug is highly addictive and must be carefully monitored as a result. Unfortunately at the same time as Purdue Pharma's extremely aggressive marketing campaign began generating over one billion dollars in sales since the introduction of the drug in 1996, criminal activity involving OxyContin increased.

[B]oth experienced drug abusers and novices, including teenagers, soon discovered that chewing an OxyContin tablet or crushing one and then snorting the powder or injecting it with a needle produced a high as powerful as heroin. By 2000, parts of the United States, particularly rural areas, began to see skyrocketing rates of addiction and crime related to use of the drug.

Even though the company represented to the public that OxyContin was less addictive than other narcotics, internal company documents rejected this assertion.

Federal officials said that internal Purdue Pharma documents show that company officials recognized even before the drug was marketed that they would face stiff resistance from doctors who were concerned about the potential of a high-powered narcotic like OxyContin to be abused by patients or cause addiction.
As a result, company officials developed a fraudulent marketing campaign designed to promote OxyContin as a time-released drug that was less prone to such problems. The crucial ingredient in OxyContin is oxycodone, a narcotic that has been used for many years. But unlike other medications like Percocet that contain oxycodone along with other ingredients, OxyContin is pure oxycodone, with a large amount in each tablet because of the time-release design.

Following a four year thorough investigation by the United State's Attorney's office, Purdue Pharma admitted its criminal conduct and concluded that:

"Nearly six years and longer ago, some employees made, or told other employees to make, certain statements about OxyContin to some healthcare professionals that were inconsistent with the FDA-approved prescribing information for OxyContin and the express warnings it contained about risks associated with the medicine. The statements also violated written Company policies requiring adherence to the prescribing information. The misstatements were made prior to July 2001 and related to the risks of addiction, abuse, withdrawal, and tolerance compared to other pain medications. We accept responsibility for those past misstatements and regret that they were made.

In my opinion, this pharmaceutical company's conduct reaffirms the dangers of tort reform and corporate secrecy. Assume that somebody ingested and became addicted to OxyContin believing that its timed release formula involved less risk of addiction than other narcotics. Should the consumer have the right to demand accountability for an addiction or damages directly resulting from the pharmaceutical company's misrepresentations about OxyContin's timed release formulation? Probably so.

I can only imagine that this company's marketing strategy never would have been disclosed had it not been for a pending criminal investigation. In the course of civil litigation, shouldn't consumers have the right to know whether a corporation lied to them? Based upon the facts set out in the New York Times article, I believe so.

Most corporations act and behave professionally. However, Purdue Pharma's conduct shows all of us why we simply cannot assume that all companies will act fairly and responsibly toward consumers and shareholders. I hope consumers use this case as an important example about why we should reject tort reform and corporate secrecy. What do you think?

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Staff Writer

Frivolous $65,000,000 Lawsuit Receiving Plenty of Attention

Staff Writer — Sat, 05 May 2007 07:20:00 GMT

I read a story today about a Judge in Washington DC who has taken it upon himself to sue a dry cleaning business for a total of $65 million dollars because the business lost a pair of his trousers. This lawsuit presents a perfect example of what appears to be frivolous litigation which should be dismissed. We hear numerous stories and media attention often focuses on frivolous litigation. We hear stories about McDonalds hot coffee and now a $65 million dollar lawsuit against a dry cleaner over a lost pair of pants. We often overlook legitimate lawsuits which serve a legitimate purpose. We do not look at litigation against pharmacists who mis-fill prescriptions or automobile manufacturers who refuse to spend a few dollars to retrofit gasoline tanks in cars making them prone to explosions. We do not look at litigation against insurance carriers who refuse to pay insurance claims to properly qualified insureds. We do not look at litigation against physicians who operate on the wrong body part. We do not look at litigation against drunk drivers who cause serious accidents and injuries on our nation's roadways.

I am absolutely certain that the number of frivolous lawsuits in this country pales in comparison to the number of lawsuits which have merit. If a lawsuit is frivolous, it must be dismissed. Our Rules of Civil Procedure require dismissal and a monetary punishment against the offending attorney or party who chooses to file frivolous litigation. In short, we can easily look to a frivolous lawsuit as an example of problems in our system of justice. Based on media accounts into the the drycleaning lawsuit, this case appears frivolous. Because our rules of civil procedure require that such frivolous lawsuits be dismissed and the judicial system will likely dismiss it, the Washington DC judge who filed suit faces penalties and dismissal for choosing to file suit. No system of justice can be considered perfect. However, because our system of justice has safeguards to prevent such frivolous litigation from moving forward, the drycleaning lawsuit should not be another rhetorical tool to advance the interest of tort reform. I can only hope that we focus the same attention on this lawsuit when it gets dismissed so that we can confirm that our judicial system works.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Staff Writer