Medical Malpractice Victims, Family Members Announce Creation of Connecticut Patients' Rights Group

3/20/2003

From: Adam Jeamel, 860-826-1796 or ajeamel@gaffneybennett.com for the New England Patients' Rights Group

HARTFORD, Conn., Mar. 19 -- United to protect patients' rights and to oppose caps on non-economic damages in cases involving medical malpractice, victims of medical malpractice and their families announced today the creation of the Connecticut Chapter of the New England Patients' Rights Group (NEPRG).

NEPRG's Connecticut Chapter, whose membership totals nearly 160 members statewide, consists of patients and families dedicated to improving patients' safety and protecting the rights of injured patients through education, accountability, and advocacy. The organization will work with various communities and interest groups in the state to promote reasonable solutions to the issue of patient safety and to ensure that any debate over the Connecticut healthcare system respects the needs of patients and families.

One of the organization's top priorities in protecting patients' rights is to oppose legislation that would place a cap on non-economic damages in cases involving medical malpractice. Medical malpractice victims call caps a one-size fits all approach that would limit the amount victims could receive to $250,000 for death, brain damage, quadriplegia, paraplegia, emotional distress, and other types of pain and suffering caused by medical malpractice.

Caps on non-economic damages would restrict patients' rights, particularly senior citizens, women and children. People with little or no earning capacity have no economic income to replace and would be limited to $250,000 for non-economic compensation no matter how severe their injuries. Placing a cap on non-economic damages would make the victims of medical malpractice also victims of bad laws.

"Most of us here today have one thing in common: our lives have been ruined by medical malpractice. That is one of the reasons why we've started the Connecticut Chapter of the New England Patients' Rights Group -- to promote the need for improvements in the quality of medical care and to ensure our concerns are heard in any debate on the state's health care system, particularly the issue of medical malpractice and caps on non-economic damages," said Steve Govoni, a Rowayton resident and acting chairman of NEPRG's Connecticut Chapter.

Govoni and the other members of the organization recommend that legislators consider proposals that would help decrease the occurrence of medical malpractice in Connecticut, including establishing such things as type-written patient reports and prescription orders, to prevent medical errors; requiring physicians to report adverse events to the state Department of Public Health; and prohibit secret settlements so that the public has access to information about physicians who've provided questionable medical treatment.

In addition, Professor Lucinda Finley, the Frank Raichle Professor of Law from the State University of New York at Buffalo Law School, released, for the first time, her study that shows the discriminatory impact of tort reform. The study reveals how caps on non-economic damages in medical malpractice cases disproportionately and adversely impact women.

Professor Finley has conducted empirical research from several states on how juries in medical malpractice and other tort suits allocate their damage awards between economic loss damages and non-economic loss damages, and then compares cases in which men are the victims and cases in which women are the victims.

Professor Finley studied cases of gynecological malpractice that resulted in impaired fertility, loss of sexual functioning, and related injuries. In California, over a ten-year period, non-economic loss damages comprised 74 percent of women's total tort recoveries for these injuries. However, as a result of California's $250,000 cap on non-economic loss damages, these injured women were deprived of substantial portions of their overall jury awards.

Professor Finley is the author of Tort Law & Practice and various articles, including "Female Trouble: The Implications of Tort Reform for Women and Tort Reform: An Important Issue for Women."

"According to my research, one major reason why women on average recover more in non-economic damages and why a far greater proportion of their total damages are for non-economic loss is that some types of injuries that happen primarily to women are compensated almost exclusively through non-economic loss damages," said Professor Finley. "The discriminatory effect will be the greatest when women experience the most profound sort of harm to their sexual and reproductive lives."

The Connecticut Chapter is part of the New England organization that was founded in 1993 and has over 1,100 members. For more information on the Connecticut Chapter of the New England Patients' Rights Group, visit their website at http://www.neprg-ct.com.