Your Uncle Dave’s mother was appointed by the governor as the lay person on her state’s medical malpractice board years ago. They would review the evidence against doctors and decide if they should keep their licenses. Based on tales she told, combined with my once having been on a jury in a medical malpractice case, nothing surprises me.
Want to see how your state stacks up on hospitals charging patients when medical errors occur? Oops. Sorry for whacking off your leg instead of just the mole. That’ll still be $10,000.
When the sharp pain shooting through Lisa Strong’s back got worse, she thought it was another kidney stone and expected the discomfort to pass. This time was different.
Everyone except the jury that ruled against Strong.
The verdict came in the face of such overwhelming evidence that in a rare move, the judge tossed out the jury's decision and ordered a new trial.
[...emergency room Dr. Laurentina] Kocik, a 30-year veteran of ER medicine, insists she told Dr. Strong over the phone that Lisa Strong likely had a kidney stone. Dr. Strong works for a firm contracted by Lisa Strong's insurance company to make medical decisions if her personal doctor isn't available or chooses not to make the call.
But Kocik didn’t write “kidney stone” on her diagnosis report. Asked during the trial if she wished she had written it down, Kocik said: “You better believe I wish I did … a million times.”
Dr. Strong remembers talking with Kocik and there was not a mention of a kidney stone. He also was not told she was in septic shock, so he went with a diagnosis of acute cholecystitis, a gallbladder condition unrelated to the kidneys.
Dr. Strong handled everything by phone, which is common in such cases.
Just what I want when desperately ill — a doctor diagnosing me by phone.
The summary of the story is terribly misleading.
The loss of her arms and legs were a result of her medical condition; her argument is that if doctors had properly treated her that she wouldn’t have lost them.
As an RN with close to 30 years of Critical Care & ER experience I have to side with the judge in this. Only a complete idiot could have blown this diagnosis. And for Dr. Strong, the so-called attending physician to decide not to even see the patient is not only negligent – it’s criminally negligent!
Unfortunately, even the hospital ER is also culpable here. The nurses should have ridden herd on the ER docs to make sure that this patient was properly cared for. All too often the Emergency Department RN is the patient’s only protection from becoming the victim of some incompetent physician’s medical misadventure.
But thank GAWD the government isn’t involved in her health care coverage. They totally would’ve fucked it up.
#3 Yeah, government involvement would have never allowed such a blunder. Idiot!
#3 Unless you were not being sarcastic, that is.
#3 & #4
Yeah, and try to collect malpractice against a government agency…a success rate similar to collecting from a Judge – zero.
This is why we need electronic medical records.
Then doctors can diagnose patients from a computer, the device that government agencies created to replace the phone as a communications device.
Speaking as a physician:
Hey, shit happens!
Sorry. Now, seriously, get used to it. Even without the type of managed care likely to come about with Obama’s plans, most current manged care plans have some sort of triage person taking phone calls. And if these telephone responders were like Rich D (above), i.e. experienced nurses, nurse practitioners or P.A.s that would be-not ideal but, ok. But the drive for profits is strong and professionals are expensive. So, you’ll find newly hatched nurses or even untrained people reading from a script or doing computer-aided diagnosis.
Sad. I am sooo glad I left the managed care practice a long time ago. I find it so much more satisfying to take care of people instead of balance sheet.
Yea—attending, treating, billing by phone is all the rage. This is a system error promoted by Doctors so they can make money by leeching off the ER docs who are paid anyway. Its establishment aided and abetted FRAUD!
Simple to correct. Your doctor is the guy who is physically present. Thats the ER Doc first, the on call Doc second, and the shit-head insurance goon when and if he shows up.
Many mistakes are because of corruption, and yes socialistic medicine should have an immediate beneficial impact on preventing for-profit motives from interfering in common sense medical care.
More medicine, saved money. Who could be against it?
#7 – No, its why the US needs a good socialized medicine scheme so people aren’t led to think that an over the phone diagnosis is acceptable, even preferable, to a low cost in-clinic examination with a doctor who isn’t in the pockets of insurance companies and the corporate interests of making money at the expense of people’s lives.
“Just what I want when desperately ill — a doctor diagnosing me by phone” – and paid by a for-profit insurance company.
The idea was that, with “managed care”, insurance companies would work to keep medical costs down. Only gullible idiots believed that any cost savings would be passed on to the consumers, rather than increasing insurance company profits. (nice lobbying and public relations work, eh?) Profit is why all companies are in business. I read that in DUH magazine!
We need to get insurance companies completely out of medicine so doctors can do their jobs. The only way that can happen is if we follow the examples of every other advanced “western country” like Canada, France, England, Holland, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Germany and others.
Want to call their systems names?
When YOU go bankrupt because of YOUR medical bills, YOU won’t care what it’s called. – YOU will wish you had it.
Everyone knows that lots of Canadians come to America in search of medical care.
But what everyone knows is wrong: a careful study concluded,
“The numbers of true medical refugees – Canadians coming south with their own money to purchase U.S. health care – appear to be handfuls rather than hordes.”
Link to the study
On the other hand,
“Driven by rising health care costs at home, nearly 1 MILLION Californians cross the border each year to seek medical care in Mexico, according a new paper by UCLA researchers and colleagues published today in the journal Medical Care.”
Link to UCLA article
————–
above is from Nobel Prize winner Prof. Paul Krugman’s blog.
#10 Riiiiight, ’cause better than a corporate sleazebacg is a government pencil pusher. Why is people so stupid to be easely bamboozled into giving all your rights to a government? Go to cuba, fer crying out loud.
#11 And you have the nerve to have such a blog alias. Get real!
6,
So, by your logic, you don’t want judges either since you can’t “collect” off of them?
The diagnosis via phone triggered a memory of when my brother was wounded when he and some of his friends were target shooting, and my bro was injured (stupid handling of the gun, wounded him about the hip, as I recall).
Getting the bill afterwards, there was one doctor listed that no one could identify, because of his not having been at the hospital, or even known to have been contacted by phone. We disputed that part of the bill and won.
Oh, this was back when we lived in FL… pre 1970
J/P=?
#14
Seems to be a problem with a certain group of people….going around telling people what they think.
You guessed wrong – cause you don’t know how I think.
But if you want a clue:
There exists a remedy to deal with Judges who make mistakes, it’s a long time consuming process that doesn’t start until the judge makes many mistakes. Is this the process you want to follow for medical mistakes?
Complain all you want about the ‘evil’ (and imperfect)profit making insurance companies, but they at least respond. The companies don’t make money when they are sued for mistakes, losing market share with bad publicity. If you would (via government) would quit telling these companies what they have to cover, the process would be alot better.
Currently there is no law that says a doctor has to do business with an insurance company. Service and payment is between the doctor and patient – insurance is a convenience, if it’s not convenient, don’t use it.
But if you want something for nothing go ahead and demand government medical – IT’S FREE.
And what quality of doctor will will you find who works for free?
“#11 And you have the nerve to have such a blog alias. Get real!”
Yes #13, I have the nerve to use any alias I like. I’m glad it ticked you off so much.
And, yes I would rather have a government “pencil pusher” paying my doctor than a “corporate sleazebag” whose only interest is his profit, deciding whether I should live or die.
Abraham Lincoln said that ours is supposed to be a government “Of the people, by the people, and for the people”.
It is not supposed to be “of the corporations, by the corporations, and for the corporations”.
Why do you and your ilk hate YOUR government so much. Is it the taxes? We still have some of the lowest taxes in the developed world – even lower than countries that have free medical care.
What’s your problem?
Can’t speak for everyone #17, but in response to your question:
I don’t hate my government per-say, it’s a necessary evil. Rather, I hate the mindless, soulless drones who are given no responsibility because they can’t trusted to do anything without a supervisor. These drones can only make themselves feel good (or useful) by comparing themselves to losers, rather than seeing how how good they could really be.
Corporate greed makes lots of money when they do the job right – and get fired when the job doesn’t get done. A government drone pencil pusher gets a paycheck no matter what quality work they do and are impossible to be fired.
I’m surprised nobody else has said it but,
SHE DOESN’T HAVE A LEG TO STAND ON!!!
<>
16,
You’re all over crazy it seems…
“There exists a remedy to deal with Judges who make mistakes, it’s a long time consuming process that doesn’t start until the judge makes many mistakes. Is this the process you want to follow for medical mistakes?”
So, what you’re saying here is that the judge will pay up, but slowly. But a private insurance company will drop dollars as soon as you complain? Hmmm… Why does CITATION NEEDED seem so relevant here?
And then you go on and say:
“Corporate greed makes lots of money when they do the job right – and get fired when the job doesn’t get done. ”
Man, I can’t even begin to pull up examples about how wrong you are precisely because google says there are 10 gajillion hits.
Health care, but its very definition, CANNOT be profitable since it’s more profitable for you to be dead than alive.
Anyhoo, rage all you want.