Maryland Malpractice Lawyer Blog

When You Can't Serve the Defendant with the Complaint

By Ronald V. Miller, Jr on July 13, 2010 3:10 PM | No Comments

In many personal injury cases, just the mechanics of filing suit dramatically increases the value. One leitmotif of a problem: serving the defendant. If, for whatever reason, someone does not want to be served, they are hard to serve with a complaint and summons.

This is a motion for alternative service for personal injury lawyers who are having difficult serving the defendant(s).

Ohio Cap on Pain and Suffering Damages

By Ronald V. Miller, Jr on June 9, 2010 3:10 PM | No Comments

Ohio adopted at pain and suffering cap of 250,000 except in catastrophic cases in 2004. The hope was to decrease health care costs.

Ohio, how is that working out for you? In 2008, four years after Ohio introduced these caps, health insurance for Ohio families in employer plans had gone up by 19 percent.

Cut Bile Duct Settlements: Gallbladder Injury

By Ronald V. Miller, Jr on February 24, 2010 4:59 PM | No Comments

According to USLaw, the average settlement in a cut bile duct gallbladder medical malpractice case is $250,000.

Famous Medical Malpractice Cases

By Ronald V. Miller, Jr on February 23, 2010 12:04 PM | No Comments

Two of the most famous medical malpractice cases - at least potentially - in history have occurred in the last year: Joe Murtha and Michael Jackson. In Maryland, we also recently had the St. Joseph's stent debacle which may go down in Maryland history as its most famous medical malpractice cases.

What has surprised a lot of medical malpractice lawyers is how little these cases have reflected the public mood on malpractice. People who learn of these cases simply process them consistent with the world view they already had on the topic of whether malpractice cases are largely meritorious and whether the system needs to be changed.

Malpractice During Colonoscopy

By Ronald V. Miller, Jr on February 11, 2010 1:17 PM | No Comments

The Maryland Daily Record reports that a Baltimore City jury ordered a doctor to pay $670,000 to a man who required emergency surgery to remove a portion of his colon because of injuries suffered during a routine colonoscopy in 2006. The doctor allegedly punctured Johnson's colon in several places during the colonscopy according to the complaint. Johnson was taken to the ER at Siani Hospitalwhere surgeons removed some of his colon (Siani was not named in the lawsuit).

Medication Errors in Maryland

By Ronald V. Miller, Jr on December 9, 2009 1:36 PM | No Comments

One cause of malpractice injuries in Maryland is medication errors. Most are harmless but a minority of medication mistakes end in tragedy.

Two leading health care organizations announce a plan to reduce medication errors, announcing a new national alert system that helps prevent dangerous and repeated medication errors. The American Society of Health-System Pharmacists (ASHP) and the Institute for Safe Medication Practices (ISMP) are partnering to develop the National Alert Network for Serious Medication Errors (NAN).

Will it help? Who knows? But we need to try more solutions to the medical error problem in this country, even if it means a few failed plans.

Health Care Reform and Our Malpractice Tort Laws

By Ronald V. Miller, Jr on September 1, 2009 12:18 PM | No Comments

Humbert J. Polito Jr., of Polito & Quinn, LLC and president of the Connecticut Trial Lawyers Association writes this editorial about tort reform and health care.

Malpractice and Health Care: Medical Malpractice Does Not Rise to the Tail That Wags the Dog

By Ronald V. Miller, Jr on September 1, 2009 11:53 AM | No Comments

Good line from Tom Baker, a professor of law and health sciences at the University of Pennsylvania School of Law and author of "The Medical Malpractice Myth," in the New York Times:

"According to the actuarial consulting firm Towers Perrin, medical malpractice tort costs were $30.4 billion in 2007, the last year for which data are available. We have a more than a $2 trillion health care system. That puts litigation costs and malpractice insurance at 1 to 1.5 percent of total medical costs. That's a rounding error. Liability isn't even the tail on the cost dog. It's the hair on the end of the tail."

Baker's conclusion is that medical malpractice reform is a red herring for those who don't want real change in health care. This might be a legitimate concern but these folks are using malpractice as an intellecutally dishonest sword in their battle.

Certifcate of Merit in Medical Malpractice Cases

By Ronald V. Miller, Jr on August 18, 2009 3:53 PM | No Comments

Maryland's Medical Malpractice Act was enacted "for purposes of weeding out non-meritorious claims and to reduce the costs of litigation. Walzer v. Osborne, 395 Md. 563, 582 (2006). Accordingly, Maryland requires a certificate of merit as a gatekeeper to keep out medical malpractice lawsuit that do not have merit.

The goal of the certificate requirement to weed out nonmeritorious claims at an early stage. The problem is that defendant's medical malpractice lawyers are using this opportunity to try to weed out good malpractice lawsuits on technicalities instead of the merits.

This is a example certificate for a medical malpractice lawsuit in Maryland.

Summary of Maryland Malpractice Law

By Ronald V. Miller, Jr on August 3, 2009 4:10 PM | No Comments

For malpractice lawyers looking at Maryland malpractice law, we have put together a summary of Maryland medical malpractice law.

Maryland Malpractice Lawyer Blog