Hey everyone,
So what do you all think about having laws that will limit the amount people can get from doctors and healthcare companies via lawsuits? In other words, should there be a reasonable limit to the amount in damages healthcare companies should pay?
Cheers!
Kirupa :gm:
there has to be a limit. if there were no limits, health insurance costs would skyrocket and become unavailable to many people who need it.
I don’t think it’s a question with the limit of money, i think it has to do with the amount of litigation period. There’s simply too much of it. People are lawsuit-crazy. If you can sue for getting ‘burned’ from a pickle on a McDonald’s hamburger (I can’t get burned from ANYTHING from McDonald’s, no matter how hard I try), you can sue for just about anything. This whole idea of sueing food companies for making them fat is utterly preposterous. THEY didn’t make you fat. YOU made you fat. If you could have realized what a normal portion is, you wouldn’t be weighin in at a quarter-ton now would you? Yes, that is slightly flawed in some sense. You can’t really be sure WHAT a normal portion is nowadays, and yes, it may not be their fault they’re fat (genetic defects have been found that lead to obesity, latest issue of National Geographic explores the hazard of fat.)
But really, some of the lawsuits are rediculous. I have to go, so more later.
well, the real mcdonalds case was someone being burned by coffee that was brewed well above the mcdonald’s standard (which was also a temp at which burning occurs). i do agree that people shouldn’t sue mcdonald’s for weight issues. but anyway, the real topic was health care, so back to that…
I’d like to keep the topic focused on healthcare if possible. The thing is, that these continuing lawsuits, are making insurance expensive not only for normal people, but doctors and hospitals have to pay a lot more in liability insurance.
While some lawsuits are legitimate, a great number of the “ambulance-chaser” lawsuits where a lawfirm tries to sue on “behalf” of consumers is only causing costs to go up. Also, physicians are more hesitant to perform increasingly complex procedures.
:hat:
So what do you all think about having laws that will limit the amount people can get from doctors and healthcare companies via lawsuits? In other words, should there be a reasonable limit to the amount in damages healthcare companies should pay?
** I think that there should be a limit on all claims not just medical related.**
** I don’t know about the states, but here in Australia it has become a problem. For instance, a lot of dr’s are no longer willing to deliver babies because the insurance premiums are through the roof. It’s just not cost effective for them to deliver babies anymore.**
This is also the case with public liability insurance, over the last year there has been a significant increase in insurance costs. Many companies have now gone out of business because they can’t afford the insurance.
** Personally I would like to see fixed amounts in a table listing the injury, and the amount to be paid out depending on if it was accidental or due to negligence.
I would also like to see more lawsuits thrown out long before they get to trial.**
For instance, I believe a council was just sued for 5 million after someone dove into water and broke their neck.
Sure the person is in a wheel chair for the rest his life, but I don’t see it as the councils fault whether or not they did or didn’t have signs there.
What sort of idiot dives into water when you don’t know how deep it is… In this case I don’t think he should have gotten a cent, it should have never gotten past pre-trial.
I also think that dr’s wages should be capped, like teachers salaries etc. Sure they worked had and spent a long time studying to get where they are, and their salaries should reflect this. But I think that with the escalating health costs, and cost of insurance their wages should be capped.
I would much rather be treated by a Dr, who became a Dr to help people. Than one who became one for the stature or the amount of money they can make.
[color=Red]********* Off topic ************
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[color=Gray]Also I don’t know about in the states, but here in Australia medical schools severely limit the amount of people they accept each year. This has nothing to do with people not being good enough. It is just them limiting the intake because they choose to do so.
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[color=Gray]As a result of this, any economist will tell you. If you limit supply you increase cost. So for the life of me I don’t see why the government doesn’t force the medical schools to take on as many students as they can. The result would be a flood of Dr’s and the wages would come down. As it is now Dr’s are in demand, there is just not enough of them, and because of this they can charge threw the roof.
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[color=Gray]Also 24hours without sleep see’s people operating as if they have a blood alcohol level of .05. It is illegal to drive a car in this country at that limit. Yet Dr’s have to sometimes work much longer than this. If it is illegal to drive a car at .05 limit, and after 24 without sleep a persons cognitive ability slacks off to that of someone with a .05 reading. Then why would you have dr’s working these hours prescribing medication ? [/color]
it seems like the easy answer, but taking on more students really isn’t the solution. here’s what happens if you take on more students: more unqualified students accepted/higher student:teacher ratio => lowered quality of education => more mistakes made in practice => higher insurance premiums.
i’m not convinced that capping dr. salaries is the answer either. because really, you could only cap drs. who are employed in hospitals or gov’t. this would drive many of the best drs. and candidates towards private practice (like plastic surgery, etc). it’s also tough to cap someone’s salary when they’ve spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on education, a risk that very few are willing or able to take on.
Not all doctors are money-greedy. I think it’s actually quite challenging for a doctor to work in a hospital (even if the salary isn’t up to the job)… It’s always a matter of what you prefer: your work or the salary of your work.
edit: about the specifics of the topic… there are too many lawsuits in the States, most of which shouldn’t even exist in the first place. Someone suing a hospital for the death of a patient should have strong basis that there was a mistake done, not just use grief as a basis to sue. Its commonly known that there are deaths in a hospital, the doctors aren’t supermen (well, in my eyes, they are, given the number of hours they work per week, but they can’t save everyone).
I think in European countries (and probably other parts of the world I haven’t visited yet) the mentality is quite different. We settle arguments before going to court. To most Europeans it seems absurd that American people sue other people for barely nothing.
As an example when I lived near boston the local newspaper often reported that a father sued another family because the son of that family had kissed his daughter. This guy would be laughed at in European countries…
So limiting money would be good, but taking care of conflicts before hand to (ie make patients sign papers that forbids sueing if the operation fails)
[size=3][color=Red]OFF TOPIC[/color][/size]
more
unqualified students accepted
higher student:teacher ratio
lowered quality of education
more mistakes made in practice
higher insurance premiums.
I never said accept unqualified students, there are plenty that score high enough ever year, but a lot don’t get in because there just aren’t enough positions.
Also for Dr you need a TER of 99… 20/20 for all your year 12 subjects, which have to be math’s 2, physics, English etc. No home ec crap.
Yet every year they put aside a number of places for Aboriginal students who only need to score 65… Which is what you get if you’re dumb, or just bum your way through high school.
These students get to go to Medical school and 60% drop out first year. Those positions could have been given to students with perfect scores.
However for the 40% that do pass, they still have the same rules for Med school as everyone else. If you fail a subject you only get to try it 1 more time. If you fail it again they kick you out.
So perhaps they bummed their way through high school or didn’t like it, but come Med school they passed all the tests just the same as any other Dr and so are just as qualified.
Therefore if you lowered the entrance rank from 99 to 80, you would have 100,000 more students each year that would apply. Given a score of 80 one would expect 80% to pass. So you would have 80,000 more Dr’s a year.
Although this country wouldn’t need 80,000 more dr’s yet.
As for lower quality, where talking uni here not high school. You go to your lectures, it doesn’t matter if there are 30 people or 400 in the theatre. And for the prac work. 1 Prac instructor could still teach 30-100+ or more a year easy. So for the price of 1 Prac instructor you get 30-100 more drs.
As for more mistakes…. I never said lower the quality of education. Therefore they would all come out the same as they do now, and so there is no reason to assume more mistakes.
Higher insurance premiums… No the exact opposite. Currently dr’s are severely over worked. ( Even if they do take 12+ weeks a year off when the average person only takes 6. )
Because they are over worked they are more likely to make mistakes. More dr’s = less workload, less mistakes. Also more dr’s means that the insurance company can spread their charge over more dr’s. So each one pays less and so do we.
Also as bookings for Dr’s are always full, they can charge what they want, which is the max. They also rush as fast as they can because there are always more people waiting.
If there was a flood of dr’s, then people could shop around for a good price, and the price would come down as they try to compete for business. Also since they wouldn’t have to see so many people each day, they could spend more time with each one, meaning less mistakes.
[size=3][color=Red]**ON TOPIC**[/color][/size]
(ie make patients sign papers that forbids sueing if the operation fails)
I thought you did have to sign consent forms before an operation, which outline that with any operation there is risk of injury or death and you accept these risks.
These however do not cover negligence, and so it shouldn’t.
If you signed papers that removed your right to sue for any reason. A Dr could turn up drunk and stoned. Kill your mother, and it’s tough luck for you because you can’t sue.
And since their behaviour is watched by the Medical Board, who are all dr’s and have a lets watch each others back attitude. He would be back in surgery drunk again in no time.
^^how do you come up w/100,000 more students? your 80 score =>80% pass doesn’t make sense. what if the required score was 85, would you then expect 85% to pass. the logic is backwards.
^^ speaking from experience, many, many university students routinely skip class. and it does make a significant difference whether 30 or 400 people are in the class. the ability to interact with a professor and learn first hand increases dramatically as student:teacher ratio drops. it would be foolish to assume that quality of education would remain constant as student:teacher ratios increases.
^^ you’re viewing doctors as providing a regular good or service, which they are not. demand for doctors is relatively inelastic. the fact of the matter is no one “shops around” for the cheapest doctor. chosing a doctor is very rarely, if ever, based on price. rather, patients chose doctors based on recommendations of quality (if the patient chooses at all).
essentially, your entire argument assumes a perfect market in which increasing the supply will automatically drop prices. flooding the market with doctors simply isn’t the answer. in reality, do we want a doctor performing surgery on us if they were accepted into med school after standards were lowered? would we look at those doctors with as much respect as doctors today?
They need to limit the punative damages to some fixed multiple of the real damages. Because real damages vary so significantly, they shouldn’t be capped, however, the punative (you gave me a scar, so pay me $10,000,000 for my pain and suffering) definitely should be.
[size=4][color=Red]OFF TOPIC[/color][/size]
^^how do you come up w/100,000 more students?
[color=Gray]Common sense…. Only a few hundred get perfect scores, the further you go down in score the more students there are that got that score.[/color][color=Gray] [/color] [color=Gray] [/color]
your 80 score =>80% pass doesn’t make sense. what if the required score was 85, would you then expect 85% to pass. the logic is backwards.
[color=Gray]No its based on the amount that fail when they are allowed to do it at 60%.[/color]
^^ speaking from experience, many, many university students routinely skip class. and it does make a significant difference whether 30 or 400 people are in the class.
[color=Gray]Well speaking from experience it makes no difference how many are sitting in a lecture theatre, and I have been in both 30ish and 400ish.[/color][color=Gray] [/color] [color=Gray] [/color]
the ability to interact with a professor and learn first hand increases dramatically as student:teacher ratio drops. it would be foolish to assume that quality of education would remain constant as student:teacher ratios increases.
[color=Gray]Uni is about self learning, the professor is there to only guide you on what you need to learn. It’s only when you are stuck that you go to see a professor, and they have scheduled times.[/color] [color=Gray]Having been in both 30-400 size classes, I can say that it made little difference to them as no one really ever goes to see them.
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[color=Gray]Also you have your lectures with the professors, and then you have tutorials with honor/phd students. These are small 30 person classes that are designed for you to asked questions about stuff that you didn’t understand.
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[color=Gray]And who said that you can’t hire more professors ?
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[color=Gray]So again, it makes no difference how many students sit in a lecture, if there are more students, there are more tutorials, and if there are more students, there are more phd/honor students to tutor them.[/color]
[color=Gray]And I don’t have the figures, but I would bet my left nut that people studying Medicine don’t skip classes like other students.[/color]
^^ you’re viewing doctors as providing a regular good or service, which they are not. demand for doctors is relatively inelastic. the fact of the matter is no one “shops around” for the cheapest doctor. chosing a doctor is very rarely, if ever, based on price.
[color=Gray]Well I don’t know about there, but here some doctors charge different amounts (though not a big defference), and some will and some won’t bulk bill. Meaning you have to have the cash when you walk in the door. And not everyone does, so they have to find one that does bulk bill.[/color]
[color=Gray][/color] [color=Gray]And the fact that no one shops around for the cheapest dr is because there is little competition. If you flood the market, some will drop prices to gain business. If one charged $25 a visit, and another $38. You would then start to see people shopping around.[/color]
[color=Gray]The only factors that makes a difference to me is my time, and weekends. On a weekend they charge more. And I will ring around to find one who has a appointment time that suits me.
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[color=Gray]If they were not so busy all they time, I might be more inclined to find a Dr that I like, knowing that I can get in to see him that day, or within a couple. But when the Dr you want is booked for 1-2 weeks. You go else where.[/color]
rather, patients chose doctors based on recommendations of quality (if the patient chooses at all).
[color=Gray]Again, it’s fine when you can get in, but when you have to wait 1-2 weeks you take what you can get.[/color]
essentially, your entire argument assumes a perfect market in which increasing the supply will automatically drop prices.
[color=Gray]Ok you show me an example in economics where this does not apply.[/color]
do we want a doctor performing surgery on us if they were accepted into med school after standards were lowered? would we look at those doctors with as much respect as doctors today?
[color=Gray]Once again, if they all have to pass the exact same tests as they do today, who cares what they got for a math’s test in year 12, as long as they passed all their med school tests they are as qualified as the next.
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[color=Gray]I don’t see the respect changing…. Don’t matter if they go 60 or 100 in high school, and you would never know anyhow.
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[color=Gray]As long as they went to med school for 5-7 years, and got that piece of paper to hang on their wall that’s all they need, and it’s that piece of paper that holds the respect.[/color]
^^ and by common sense you mean that you completely made up the 100,000 number? so i could make up a number… 700,000 and it holds as much weight as your number.
^^ show me your math b/c your numbers seem completely arbitrary.
^^ i’m not going to waste my time anymore. this argument is foolish.
^^once a week recitations with an advanced student for an hour is no where near the same as a small class taught by a professor. it really cannot be compared.
^^good luck finding enough candidates who both want to teach and are qualified. especially to support “100,000” more students. that’s not to mention issues with tenure and school funding (b/c most universities do not make money on tuition. most actually lose money on tuition and make money on research. hence, research professors are more valuable financially to a university than teaching professors).
^^ this is definitely true and it would be foolish to argue against it.
^^ doctors ALREADY charge different amounts. yet nobody shops around for doctors based on price. the closest your argument can come to success is that some people will avoid going to any doctor because they cannot afford it. but even those people are not shopping around.
^^ since you asked for it, macroeconomics at it’s finest: as i said before, the demand for medical treatment is fairly inelastic - meaning it’s not changing. people need doctors as much in bad times as in good. when that happens, we see the demand curve become completely vertical (until p*, the price at which patients simply cannot afford anymore. at p*, the demand line becomes perfectly horizontal).
great, so if drawn out, you would see that an increase in supply actually does lower price. but there’s a big problem: doctors know the patients willingness to pay. through health care companies and research, doctors know how much they can charge and get away with it. so they are able to set their prices at p*, the maximum amount a patient can afford. because people do not shop around for doctors based on price, but rather convenience and quality, doctors then have no incentive to lower prices below p*. if you really want, i can draw the whole graph out, i just don’t have time for it now.
^^ imagine a prestigious university, let’s say harvard for example. if harvard all of a sudden started accepting candidates with lower standardized test scores and grades, a harvard degree in 2010 would not hold the weight of a harvard degree in 1990 (note: this is why many alumni donate to schools - to help retain the value of their degree). similarly, if there were a flood of doctors to the market, becoming a doctor after the lowered standard would not be as respected or valued as before.
[color=Red]OFF TOPIC[/color]
Originally Posted by bhw2
^^ and by common sense you mean that you completely made up the 100,000 number? so i could make up a number… 700,000 and it holds as much weight as your number.
[color=Gray]Yes that number is made up of a rough guess of how many students in Australia each year would get around 80% for year 12.
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[color=Gray]
I was trying to be conservative with that number, but even if I was stupid and said there were only 10,000 each year. And that 50% would fail. That’s still 5000 new Dr’s a year. Or about 1000 new dr’s a year for each state/territory in Australia and that would still make a HUGE difference to heath care.
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[color=Gray]I would even be as bold to say that 1000 more Dr’s in New York would make a difference, even if New York’s population is around that of Australia.[/color]
Originally Posted by bhw2
^^ show me your math b/c your numbers seem completely arbitrary.
[color=Gray]Med students who scored 100 for year 12, have a (5% fail rate ?) when studying medicine.
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[color=Gray]Aboriginals who got a score 60, have a 40% fail rate.
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[color=Gray]I don’t think it a stretch to assume that students who scored 80 at year 12 would have a lower fail rate than those who got 60.
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[color=Gray]If this logic seems incorrect to you, then whatever. It works for me.[/color]
Originally Posted by bhw2
^^ i’m not going to waste my time anymore. this argument is foolish.
[color=Gray]Well like I said I have been in both 30 and 400 size classes.[/color][color=Gray]
Biology and java/C programming around 400 per lecture.
Psychology around 200 per lecture.
Neuroscince/Speech Patholgy (topics taught by the school of Medicine) around <100.
Cognitive science topics around 30.
They were all the same, it made no difference how many were in the lectures.
And all the tutorials only have <30 in them.
So I don’t know what topics you were/are in, or how your topics are taught, but class size made no difference at my University.[/color]
Originally Posted by bhw2
^^once a week recitations with an advanced student for an hour is no where near the same as a small class taught by a professor. it really cannot be compared.
[color=Gray]I have had both, and from my experience the proffesors turn tutorials into more of a mini lecture. Where advanced students are more casual and people are more inclined to ask questions and get feed back.
So I say it makes no real difference, well at least it didn’t to me.[/color]
Originally Posted by **bhw2
**^^good luck finding enough candidates who both want to teach and are qualified. especially to support “100,000” more students. that’s not to mention issues with tenure and school funding (b/c most universities do not make money on tuition. most actually lose money on tuition and make money on research. hence, research professors are more valuable financially to a university than teaching professors).
[color=Gray]Obviously you wouldn’t just open up 100,000 new places, it would take a few years to develop the infrastructure to support them.[/color][color=Gray]
From my experience there are plenty of people who are qualified to teach and do research, but the uni doesn’t have the facilities or the need for them.
I don’t know about the States but I know my UNI made $13 Million ? this financial year, That ontop of building new carparks, walk ways etc etc. And thanks to this crap government, they have just increased their fees by the Maximum 25% allowable, so what will they make next financial year ? $16 + Million ?
And I thought most lectures, lecture, because they have to as apart of receiving their tenure. They get some money and facilities, and they have to lecture in return.[/color]
Originally Posted by bhw2
^^ doctors ALREADY charge different amounts. yet nobody shops around for doctors based on price.
[color=Gray]And what sort of price difference are we talking about, because here it is nothing or $5ish. Hardly worth the effort of not going to the Dr that is the closest to you, or waiting for an appointment at a cheaper one.[/color]
Originally Posted by **bhw2
**: as i said before, the demand for medical treatment is fairly inelastic - meaning it’s not changing.
[color=Gray]Well Australia has a aging population so it is forever increasing, and some people don’t or put off going because they can’t afford it.
Is the population in the US or where ever you’re from aging or not changing?
(Because an older population requires more care incase you didn’t make the link.)[/color][color=Gray]
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Originally Posted by bhw2
^^ imagine a prestigious university, let’s say harvard for example. if harvard all of a sudden started accepting candidates with lower standardized test scores and grades, a harvard degree in 2010 would not hold the weight of a harvard degree in 1990
[color=Gray]Well one would expect all uni’s to lower their score to spread the burdon of new students across them all. And in doing so may in fact have the opposite effect.[/color][color=Gray]
Say currently Harvard takes in 100 medicine students a year. Then like all Universities there are forced to take in 10% more.
To do this all Universities are told to accept applicants who scored 80, instead of 100.
There would be nothing to stop Harvard from setting it’s own entrance exams harder than anyone else’s.
So even though Harvard are forced to take on 10 more students a year, you still know that they are the very best that are available.[/color]
[color=Gray](of coarse the whole idea that a dr that comes out of Harvard, is any better than one that went some where else is just stupid. It may in fact be the exact opposite. Since one can imagine that those that do go to Harvard were born with a silver spoon in their mouth, and have grown up arrogant and sheltered. Just the type of good beside manner you’re after.)[/color]
Originally Posted by bhw2
(note: this is why many alumni donate to schools - to help retain the value of their degree).
[color=Gray]We don’t have alumni in Australia, so I can’t comment on that. Though I have no doubt there would be other reasons for them to do so.[/color]
Originally Posted by bhw2
similarly, if there were a flood of doctors to the market, becoming a doctor after the lowered standard would not be as respected or valued as before.
[color=Gray]As I said a number of times before…. You’re not lowing the standards of the Dr’s. There Medicine degrees are exactly the same as they are now.[/color][color=Gray]
You are just giving more people the opportunity to attempt the degree.
So the value and respect has no reason to change.
And lets not forget that Aboriginals who get a score of 60, are allowed to attempt medical school, and do pass.
These are people who did so poor in high school, that they would be lucky to be accepted into an Arts degree at Uni.
Yet they pass Medical school and become Dr’s just the same as people who scored 100 at high school.
[font="]It’s called opportunity and desire. If you think that someone who scored 60, is not as intelligent as someone who scored 100, you have to be stupid. There is no reason to respect one more than the other.
[/font]Well you have argued against every point I have made but one. (med students wouldn’t skip class like others)
How about you offer a suggestion on how to better the Health system and lower the cost of Dr’s. Since everything I say is wrong and wont work ?[/color]
that’s unfair Vulcan. His arguments against your suggestions to a better Health System does not mean he has better suggestions. Just that he thinks yours aren’t good enough.
There is nothing unfair at all about asking him to offer better suggestions.
All he has to say is he has none, or has no idea, or to put some out there.
And no, just because he thinks mine wouldn’t work, it doesn’t mean he has to have his own.
Even if he has none, it is still fine for him to say mine work for what ever reason.
[offtopic]
Sorry I’m gonna be a ****tart on that one…
“How about you offer a suggestion on how to better the Health system and lower the cost of Dr’s. Since everything I say is wrong and wont work ?” in my view strongly implies that he should have another idea (implied by the SINCE).
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lol… fine in your view it implies that.
I did type something along the lines of ,“since you know everything I offer is wrong, then you must know what is right, so how do you suppose you fix it”.
But then I realised just because he knows/thinks mine don’t work, it doesn’t mean that he has to know of a better way, and so I deleted a couple of sentences and re-wrote them to what you feel still implies something.
I thought that the change was enough NOT to imply that he had to have a solution, but if he had one I wanted to hear it. 
And since I have clearly written what I meant for it to imply… I dont see it as a issue anymore.
^^ my suggestion… in the 2nd post of the thread. my other suggestion is to offer more funding for students to attend medical school (ie scholarships and federal loans [which carry a lower interest rate than bank loans]).
when i said the demand for health care is inelastic, i was taking into consideration the elderly population. the USA is currently seeing the baby-boomer generation turn into senior citizens and demanding large amounts of medical treatment. so yes, in that respect the demand is changing. but when someone talks about the demand being inelastic, they are more specifically referring to the demand driven by economic changes. regardless of economic conditions, the need for medical care is going to be about the same.
^^there’s a reason why engineers strive to go to MIT or UCal-Berkeley, why MBA students want to attend Harvard, and performing arts majors look to Julliard. it isn’t because the campus is beautiful or the people are nice. they go because the education will make them more polished and ready for the professional world than at other institutions.
also, you really shouldn’t assume that just because someone attends harvard (or any school of that caliber) that they were “born with a silver spoon in their mouth”. tuition at my school runs $2000/yr more than harvard… does that mean i’m silver spoon fed? you should look at endowment funds for schools like harvard and realize that those schools also offer significantly more scholarships and grants than most schools. it’s one thing to assume a level of education based on what institution someone attends, it’s a completely different thing to assume something about someone’s personality or background.
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