This isn't a partisan issue. This is an issue about helping people. It could be you one day that suffers injury at the hands of a negligent doctor. This is not a money issue, this is a health care issue.

Vote AGAINST Prop 12

amen to that!

Karmark Horn
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moron



[This message has been edited by 13 0 Branding Iron (edited 9/12/2003 6:31p).]

Corporate interests have gotten out of hand in this country. In Texas, they are trying to use Prop 12 as a way to get around large settlements.

Time to bust the trusts!

Scumbag plaintiff attorneys aren't out of control at all.

Screw that. I'm tired of the ambulance chasers bilking the system. If they really want to help the little guy, the lawyers will be glad to continue to help 'em for $250,000. No one deserves a lottery check for this. It's usually the 78 year old who's been 100 lbs. overweight their whole life, who's smoked and drank for 50 years and dies in a nursing home...somehow they'll make that the doctor's fault.

Since it's not really about the money, surely all the plantiffs attorneys will continue to vigorously support all the medical malpractice claims regardless of how much they can get for it.

[This message has been edited by ttechguy (edited 9/12/2003 6:50p).]

You've been hoodwinked people! The corporate money is blinding you!

Hell, many of them charge 45% and will get $337,500.00. That's not enough, though. What a bunch of swine.

13-0 : its 45% PLUS expenses.

A good rule of thumb would be to do the exact opposite of whatever Karma Horn advises.

Karma Horn is a Tool.

Sixty percent of Texas counties have NO doctors who will deliver babies.

Just in the last week I've met 2 doctors who have closed their practices in Texas. One surgeon from Houston has gone to work for the Bureau of Indian Affairs in Oklahoma and one Family Practitioner has just closed her practice in our small town. Fortunately, her husband has a job.

The thing is: Texas has just lost TWO DOCTORS it couldn't afford to lose!!
And more and more will shut their doors if Prop 12 is turned down. They just can't afford to practice anymore.

I tell you, I'd rather have a doctor by me in an emergency than a lawyer (and I'd bet Karma would, too, if he's not too much of an imbecilic dupe of the lawyers to admit it.)

So, I'm voting FOR Prop 12.

Already voted yes to prop 12.

Everytime I drive through the Texas Medical Center, or for that matter any hospital system, and drive past the physicians' parking spaces on my way up to Level 12, I don't see very many 1972 Ford pickups, Mazda Miatas or Volkswagen Rabbits.

The amount of money a physician brings home should not be a liscence to grant lotto checks for non-economic damages.

Tell that to someone who's lost an eye, or a leg, or a lung, to negligence.

What is the "economic" cost of an organ these days?

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Sixty percent of Texas counties have NO doctors who will deliver babies.

Just in the last week I've met 2 doctors who have closed their practices in Texas. One surgeon from Houston has gone to work for the Bureau of Indian Affairs in Oklahoma and one Family Practitioner has just closed her practice in our small town. Fortunately, her husband has a job.

The thing is: Texas has just lost TWO DOCTORS it couldn't afford to lose!!
And more and more will shut their doors if Prop 12 is turned down. They just can't afford to practice anymore.

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While the spirit of Prop 12 is good, it won't fix the problem. Just because non-economic awards are capped, does not mean that all of a sudden malpractice insurance rates will drop. See similar legislation in California (where the cap was only $250,000)where malpractice rates actually climbed 400+% the years after the law was passed. There is no agreement with the insurance companies to reduce malpractice insurance rates. Everyone just thinks they are going to be good guys and drop them because they are paying out less in claims. Well, if they don't have to drop the rates or don't sign an agreement to do so, they will hold rates (or even raise them) and just make more money.

Prop 12 has good intentions, but it I am against it because it will not produce the result everyone thinks it will.

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Tell that to someone who's lost an eye, or a leg, or a lung, to negligence.

What is the "economic" cost of an organ these days?

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What if the doctor only brings home 60K? Is the organ then worth less than if the doctor makes 600K?

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Everytime I drive through the Texas Medical Center, or for that matter any hospital system, and drive past the physicians' parking spaces on my way up to Level 12, I don't see very many 1972 Ford pickups, Mazda Miatas or Volkswagen Rabbits

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stop being a jackass, go to school till you are 30 then come back and ***** about the salaries doctors get.

Since all the plantiffs attorneys are making 500K per year, will they agree to take only, say, 3%? Since they're only interested in helping those who can't help themselves, and since they make enough money anyway, I'm sure this wouldn't be a problem.

How much do lawyers pay in malpractice insurance? What if they make a mistake?

[This message has been edited by ttechguy (edited 9/12/2003 10:26p).]

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Tell that to someone who's lost an eye, or a leg, or a lung, to negligence.

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what are you trying to say here? That you expect every one of the millions of procedures doctors perfom every year to go flawlessly? Sometimes things go wrong, and sometimes doctors make mistakes.

Minors can't vote.

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what are you trying to say here? That you expect every one of the millions of procedures doctors perfom every year to go flawlessly? Sometimes things go wrong, and sometimes doctors make mistakes.

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This is what kills me. Back in the day, there used to be a thing called accidents or even honest mistakes. What if a lawyer screws up? Well, maybe he loses a case and doesn't make partner. No one asks him or his insurance to pay a gazillion bucks.

I'm all for getting compensated if you were injured...I guess. We all know (or should know) that there are risks with most any medical procedure. If they go wrong (unless the doctor purposely did you wrong), I don't see why that entitles someone to be a millionaire.

[Note: I can't believe I agree with Mark Brown's biggest fan, but . . .]

Proposition 12 is un-American, plain and simple.

Even as a DEFENSE attorney (i.e. we fight AGAINST the scumbag plaintiffs' lawyers who have no ethics and are a plight to good lawyers everywhere). As such, I've seen some pretty bad verdicts. I've been a part of cases that were won because out-of-control juries didn't listen to the evidence awarded outrages verdicts. However, I've also seen a case where a doctor who had been drinking 2 hours before a surgery killed a young boy during a routine surgery. All of the nurses and his assissting doctor testified against him. The jury, rightly, awarded the parents a multi-million dollar verdict, more than $1M in punative damages. Last I heard, the doctor is still practicing. If proposition 12 (God forbid) would have been in place when this happened, this doctor wouldn't have gotten what was coming to him and these parents wouldn't have gotten nearly what they deserved for this doctor's misdeeds.

Now, there is definately a problem in some areas of Texas with juries that award insane amounts of money in bad cases where the doctors aren't nearly as culpable. Something should be done about this. Something should also be done about the insurance companies who are making millions by overcharging doctors for malpractice insurance. That is the real problem. And the insurance companies have already said that (on average) malpractice insurance rates will go down by 18% if prop 12 passes -- so no real relief to doctors.

And the crap above about no doctors delivering babies in 60% of Texas counties is ludicrous. Please provide a link . . . and think about what you're saying. That means that in 60% of Texas counties women must be having babies in their bathtubs with the assistance of the neighborhood plumber. Does that sound plausible? I didn't think so.

Don't believe the hype.

"Steadfast in our purpose, we now press on. We have known freedom's price. We have shown freedom's power. And in this great conflict, my fellow Americans, we will see freedom's victory."
-- George W. Bush, State of the Union, January 29, 2002


[This message has been edited by Col. Nathan R. Jessup (edited 9/12/2003 10:38p).]

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What if a lawyer screws up?

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He loses his license and can't practice law anymore. He also has to pay damages to whomever he has screwed up and hurt.

Are you allowed to make any mistakes?

This is freakin' rediculous........A doctor makes 150K a year and pays 100 in liability insurance, and the freakin' ambulance chasers are the only ones that make money off of malpractice suits. The medical field is not an exact science and should'nt be regulated as such...... Quit whining you p#ssy liberal limp wristed chode.......

Karma Horn = Karma Chameleon

Stevee,

That's my point. There's no griping about their salaries here. Doctors EARN what they make. They are in a high-risk profession. It shouldn't be a surprise for someone who's in that kind of work to be gouged by malpractice insurance. There's risk involved in what they do. And ttechguy, you're right, one has to expect a number of accidents to happen.

Your question about the cost of an organ with a 60K or 600K doctor is a sound one. So let me turn it around a bit...

What's the damages for a human life lost during a routine procedure versus one caused by a surgeon who had too many martinis at lunch?

Prop 12 deserves a quick death. We can write a better one.

LSU- I'm with you on one thing: if a doctor is drunk and botches an operation, then all bets are off, take him for whatever you can get. Why can't this be in a different class than the doc who gets sued because somehow a 80 year old, who was gonna die that day anyway, didn't make it through a surgery?

ttechguy,

Agreed. Two totally different circumstances. That's why I like Texas. It allows the jury, the people, to decide the damages.

Do we all trust our fellow Texans enough to do the right thing in awarding damages?

Don't pass Prop 12 and Texas will wind up like Nevada where you have to go out of state to have babies delivered.

A happy health profession is good for all Texas residents.

If you want to know the alternative do some research on healthcare in Nevada........

Unfortunately, I don't. Too many people think the damages are somehow linked to how deep the pockets are on the other side.

It's the same in other facets of life. Somehow, people seem to suffer more when they get rear-ended by a Coca-Cola company car than some college student in a Pinto.

I remember my mother in law telling me about having dinner in Beaumont with a several friends. One of them was a doctor.

Some guy a few tables over started choking...people were assisting him. My mother in law looked at her doctor friend and said "Aren't you going to do something?". His reply: "Hell no....if anything goes wrong I get sued."

They wouldn't let my wife and me videotape the sonogram when our children were in the womb. Apparently, somebody had sued them for misdiagnosing the gender of a child at 16 weeks.

You guys have to understand they deal with life and death at every decision. Hell even taking someone's blood or giving an IV can cause a staff infection that could be potentially fatal. Unfortunately our society of expected perfection and the "ER" generation have put unrealistic expectations on medical personell, and it is getting harder and harder to find quality people willing to take the personal and professional risk to stay in the business of helping sick people.

I bet Mark Brown voted against it.