Recent News
High Court’s Contempt for Lawmakers’ Authority, Lawsuit Rackets Place Florida atop Latest ‘Judicial Hellholes’ List
WASHINGTON, D.C., December 5, 2017 – The American Tort Reform Foundation issued its 2017-2018 Judicial Hellholes® report today, naming courts in Florida, California, Missouri, New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Illinois and Louisiana among the nation’s “most unfair”...
Court Stays Order Striking Down Medical Review Panel Law
FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) — The Kentucky Court of Appeals has stayed a lower court's ruling striking down a state law requiring a panel of doctors to review medical malpractice cases before going to trial. Franklin County Circuit Judge Phillip Shepherd's Oct. 30 order...
Florida Supreme Court tosses out part of state medical malpractice law
TALLAHASSEE-- Saying that changes approved by lawmakers “have gashed Florida’s constitutional right to privacy,” a sharply divided Florida Supreme Court on Thursday rejected parts of a controversial 2013 medical-malpractice law. Justices, in a 4-3 decision, said the...
Judge strikes down new Kentucky law creating medical review panels
Dealing a major blow to efforts to curb supposedly frivolous malpractice claims, a judge has struck down a new Kentucky law creating medical review panels to screen such cases before they go to trial. In a ruling Monday, Franklin Circuit Judge Phillip Shepherd found...
Law written to deter frivolous malpractice lawsuits declared unconstitutional
A state law designed to deter the filing of frivolous medical malpractice lawsuits was declared unconstitutional Tuesday by the Oklahoma Supreme Court. This is the third time the state Supreme Court has struck down similar legislation. In each case, the Legislature...
Arkansans for Jobs and Justice Launches Campaign for Real Tort Reform in Arkansas
A coalition representing a diverse group of Arkansans has joined together to support commonsense reforms that will help make Arkansas more competitive with surrounding states and protect everyday Arkansans. Paperwork was filed today for Arkansans for Jobs and Justice...
‘Sorry’ doesn’t mean they’ll sue: How hospitals avoided lawsuits after adverse events
Communication-and-resolution programs (CRP) at four Massachusetts hospitals led to lower medical liability costs and improvements in patient safety after adverse events, countering concerns that telling patients about errors would motivate more to file lawsuits. Led...
Physicians Say Up to 30% of Treatment Unnecessary
Despite years of emphasis on curbing costly and potentially harmful unnecessary care, physicians believe that overtreatment remains an ongoing problem, according to research from Johns Hopkins University published this week in the journal PLOS ONE. The findings, based...
Advances in Patient Safety and Medical Liability
Research in patient safety and medical liability in recent years has widened our definition of these terms. Patient Safety improvement is no longer a preventive strategy to protect medical facilities from lawsuits—it is a serious and wide-reaching effort to measurably...
Brace Yourself for an Ob/Gyn Shortage by 2020
Depending on where you live in the United States, it could already be tough to find an obstetrician/gynecologist—almost half of U.S. counties lack one, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. But recent studies show that the problem is only going to get...