Professional liability claims prevention.

Abstract

Analysed in retrospect to trace causes, nearly all professional liability claims are found to have been preventable. But when we compare these real causes of claims and suits with the kinds of professional liability claims prevention we often hear recommended, the treatment appears to be directed at symptoms rather than at the disease. Professional liability claims will be neither prevented nor reduced in size or frequency by educating attorneys, by reducing the amount of insurance physicians carry, by attempts to cover up in cases in which the doctor is legally liable for injuries suffered by the patient, by seeking special legislation that would in effect place the physician above the law, by circularizing lists of patients who have sued doctors, or by any other action that does not strike at the real causes of claims and suits. Any program that is unrealistic, that is unobjective in its approach or that