PHILADELPHIA REFLECTIONS
The musings of a Philadelphia Physician who has served the community for nearly six decades

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Sorry, But This May Hurt a Little

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Dentist Tooth

Quite beyond sociological curiosity about what makes one patient sue when many seemingly identical ones do not, is the alarming potential of indemnifying them all. If the tort system already generates unsupportable costs from a small sample, extending those costs manyfold defies all prediction. Something like this happened in asbestos litigation, and that industry seems utterly destroyed. We will later list this issue among the areas most in need of more reliable data, not jibes and denials. Lacking that, concepts of no-fault or alternative dispute resolution must definitely be restrained from going forward. If ninety or more percent of medical injuries are accepted by the patients as simply inevitable in a highly complex system of well-trained professionals doing their best to avoid harm, that is gratifying to hear until the consequences are examined. Take away the courtroom's implication of blame, and almost all such cases would come forward to request what society then declares is their just compensation. That would be an entitlement to end all entitlements.

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