America's doctors, stung by rapidly rising malpractice insurance
costs, are seeking to become a more potent political force in
state legislatures across the country.
From West Virginia to Nevada, doctors are picketing, protesting
and running for political office in greater numbers than ever.
Some are even withholding services. The most recent example
is in Philadelphia, where more than 300 doctors shuttered offices
one day last week to attend a conference on medical malpractice
issues.
That's behavior rarely seen before by doctors. Some hope that
by becoming politically active, they can influence issues beyond
medical malpractice, such as Medicare's solvency and prescription-drug
costs.
"It's completely weird for physicians to be doing this," says
Weldon Havins, CEO and special counsel for the Clark County
Medical Society in Las Vegas. "Doctors are competing with lawyers
who have, from their first day of law school, been trained and
are aware of the political process and the importance of law.
Doctors have absolutely zero training with that."
The nation's largest physicians group, the American Medical
Association, hopes to raise $15 million over 18 months to run
advertising campaigns and stage protests. The political action
fund — the largest the AMA has aimed to collect for a specific
cause — is intended to pay for TV ads, pamphlets and protests.
Fueling the trend are insurance premiums that skyrocketed
as much as 300% this year in Nevada, West Virginia, Florida,
Pennsylvania and other states. It followed a decision by St.
Paul Cos., the nation's No. 2 malpractice insurer, to pull out
of the business in December amid ever-higher jury awards.
Other insurers, responding to St. Paul, raised their own rates
exponentially or stopped writing policies to doctors in high-risk
specialties, such as obstetrics and surgery. As a result, hundreds
of physicians have stopped practicing or fled to other states
rather than pay premiums of more than $100,000 a year.
"Doctors feel like no one is listening to them, that Congress
hasn't listened to them and state governments haven't listened
to them," says Robert D'Alessandri, dean of the West Virginia
University School of Medicine.
Mary Alexander, president of the Association of Trial Lawyers
of America, says the problem lies with mismanaged insurance
companies that suffered huge stock-market losses and want to
blame their woes on the legal system.
Doctors are demanding state and federal laws to cap punitive
damages, make it more difficult for lawyers to bring lawsuits
and limit lawyers' shares of jury awards.
Republicans generally have been more amenable to such reforms
in Congress. President Bush voiced his support for doctors in
July in a North Carolina speech. "The unpredictability of our
liability system means that even frivolous cases — people call
them 'junk lawsuits' — carry the risk of enormous burdens,"
Bush said.
Lawyers and legal interest groups have given 71% of their
$430 million in political contributions to Democrats since 1990,
federal records show. Health-care professionals gave less than
half that amount; 52% went to Republicans.
Outmatched in Washington, doctors are seeking other ways to
sway public opinion. They have protested outside government
buildings and courthouses in more than 10 states. Twelve doctors
sought state legislature seats in West Virginia and Nevada this
year. There are no national figures on doctors running for office.
Says Donald Palmisano, president-elect of the American Medical
Association: "We have to take control over our own destiny."
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