Recent Florida News

April 2024 Newsletter

Shining a light on third-party financing of liability lawsuits Opinion leaders in the Sunshine State are pushing for the legislature to shed light on third-party financing of medical liability lawsuits, calling for a special legislative session to curb this practice,...

We Need A Special Session for Lawsuit Reform

The Florida Legislative session concluded March 8 and while so much progress has been made to restore balance to the tort system in Florida, much remains to be done. Make no mistake about it. Due to the work of the legislature and governor in last year’s legislative...

Special Session For More Tort Reform?

For over a couple of decades, Florida was listed on the annual “Judicial Hellholes” report produced by the American Tort Reform Association. But little by little, under the leadership of Gov. Ron DeSantis, that began to change. In the spring legislative session of...

Current Medical Liability Laws

Damage Caps	For physicians $500,000 cap on non-economic damages per claimant with any one physician not responsible for more than $500,000. For nonpractitioners, $750,000 cap on non-economic damages. The cap increases to $1 million in non-economic damages for physicians if the negligence resulted in death or a permanent vegetative state or if the court finds that a manifest injustice would occur unless the non-economic damages cap was increased because the non-economic harm sustained by the patient was particularly severe and the defendant’s negligence caused a catastrophic injury to the patient. (2003)
Joint Liability Reform	Yes. Defendants are responsible only for their proportionate share of negligence.
Collateral Source Reform	Yes, and the court must reduce damages by the amounts paid to the claimant from collateral sources. If a right of subrogation exists, there is no reduction in damages. Benefits received by the government sources are not considered collateral benefits.
Attorney Fees Limited	Patients receive 70% of the first $250,000 awarded and 90% of the remainder of the award. Attorneys will still get payment for court and witness expenses. (2004) Patients may waive contingency fee limits.
Periodic Payments Permitted	Yes, for future economic awards exceeding $250,000, the court must order periodic payments at the request of any party unless the court determines that manifest injustice would result to any party.