Profession
Appeals court upholds rejection of first CIGNA settlement
NEWS IN BRIEF — Posted March 22, 2004
A federal appeals court in February ruled that U.S. District Judge Federico Moreno was correct in stopping a settlement agreement between an Illinois physician and CIGNA Corp. from going forward in December 2002.
The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said Moreno did not "abuse his discretion" because the settlement would have impacted all of the class-action lawsuit claims against CIGNA that Moreno was overseeing.
Illinois physician Timothy N. Kaiser, MD, was the first physician in the country to receive class-action status for a lawsuit he filed against CIGNA challenging the way the company reimburses physicians. A state court in Illinois made that ruling before federal lawsuits in Moreno's Miami court received nationwide class-action status.
Note: This item originally appeared at http://www.ama-assn.org/amednews/2004/03/22/prbf0322.htm.
