A Letter to President Bush Regarding Patients’ Bill of Rights Legislation
February 6, 2002
The Honorable George W. Bush
President of the United States
The White House
Washington, DC 20500
Dear Mr. President,
The Doctors Company, a professional liability provider owned by over 20,000 physician policyholders, continues to support your efforts in working with Congress towards the passage of a Patients’ Bill of Rights.
The Doctors Company is concerned that any Patients’ Bill of Rights legislation should not expand the already enormous liability burdens physicians face. In an effort to provide patients with the tools needed to obtain medical services from their HMO, we believe both HR. 2563 and S. 1052 inadvertently expose individual physicians to increased liability because of loose definitions and unclear wording.
- S. 1052 uses “treating physician” and the term should be defined in a comprehensive way. Physicians that consult or otherwise provide services but are not “hands on” should be included in a provided definition.
- S. 1052 allows the plaintiff to bring suit in either Federal or State court should the case involve a medically reviewable decision. If brought to Federal Court where the cap on noneconomic damages is set at $1.5 million for HMOs, individual physicians included in such a suit should be granted a cap reasonable to individual status and not the same as an institution. We request that $250,000 be the cap level. If a suit is brought to a State Court under S. 1052 no caps at all are provided if none exist in state statute. This should be remedied in all fairness if a choice between Federal and State venues is allowed.
- S. 1052 does not address the situation where administrative decisions made by an HMO, (i.e., delayed appointments or lower level diagnostic procedures), result in a “medically reviewable decision.” Physicians should be specifically exempt from such cases; current bill language exposes physicians to lawsuits even though they were not the decision makers.
- HR. 2563 contains language prohibiting the use of pre-dispute binding arbitration. This issue was never discussed in committee or on the House floor. Pre-dispute binding arbitration is a mechanism that has proven to be an effective non-judicial means of resolving disputes and should not be summarily prohibited by language that has not been aired in public debate.
The Doctors Company urges your staff to address the specifics, as described above, of the two bills under consideration. The physician community looks to you for fair public policy development.
Sincerely,
Manuel S. Puebla
President
MSP/amv
