Profession
Survey finds most Americans support caps
NEWS IN BRIEF — Posted April 26, 2004
A recent survey conducted for the Health Coalition on Liability and Access found 72% of respondents favor a federal law that limits noneconomic damages in medical malpractice lawsuits and 73% want to limit the amount trial lawyers can collect.
More than 80% surveyed said excessive litigation is pushing up insurance costs to a point that forces doctors to leave practice, and 72% said litigation costs are pushing up health care expenses for all Americans. A little more than half of those surveyed, 55%, said the high number of medical liability lawsuits is unjustified, while 16% said the number of lawsuits against health practitioners is lower than justified.
The margin of error is plus or minus 3.1 percentage points at a 95% confidence level.
HCLA is made up of more than 75 organizations that represent physicians, hospitals, insurers, pharmaceutical companies, employers, health care consumers and others.
Note: This item originally appeared at http://www.ama-assn.org/amednews/2004/04/26/prbf0426.htm.
