Oklahoma doctors protest the high cost of malpractice insurance

Oklahoma doctors converged on the state Capitol in Oklahoma City to rally for tort reform Wednesday. <br><br>They say frivolous lawsuits have driven up the cost of malpractice insurance so much that it's

Wednesday, February 25th 2004, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

Oklahoma doctors converged on the state Capitol in Oklahoma City to rally for tort reform Wednesday.

They say frivolous lawsuits have driven up the cost of malpractice insurance so much that it's driving doctors out of business. News on 6 business reporter Steve Berg has more.

Tulsa doctors headed for Oklahoma City by the busload, for a different sort of medical crisis. "We've already had doctors retiring early. We've had doctors leaving the state, we've had doctors quitting doing surgery." Dr. Lynn Frame says he pays $80,000 a year in malpractice insurance premiums.

Doctors blame frivolous lawsuits and multi-million dollar jury verdicts for making the insurance so expensive that no doctor, good or bad, can afford it. They say they want people compensated if they're injured by true malpractice, but they want a limit on the huge pain-and-suffering judgments. "People will still be able to get all their lost wages, all their medical expenses but the pain and suffering portion would be capped at $300,000." Attorney Jennifer D'Angelis says it's a bad idea.

For one thing, she says, children and the elderly who suffer malpractice are usually not wage-earners. "So what you're creating with this legislation is the potential to say that only people who are wage-earners have a value." She says if doctors think they're paying too much in insurance, talk to the insurance companies.

"I think you should take a look at very close look at the salaries of the CEO's of those insurance companies and how those monies are being invested, how the premiums are being invested. There's been a fear frankly by the doctors to challenge the insurance companies, their own insurance companies, to challenge their own, to try to reform this system themselves, yet they're in the strongest position."

Whoever's to blame, if they can't find a solution, the doctor crowd may get smaller.