From Point of Law:
In Waukegan, Ill., 49-year-old Beatrice Vance died of a heart attack after waiting two hours in a hospital waiting room. A coroner's jury has declared her death a homicide. (Lake County News-Sun, AP, Chicago Tribune). Medical blogs are discussing: GruntDoc, MedPundit, KevinMD.
Reading the comments from doctors on the medical blogs was quite informative. The MD's basic attitude seems to be "shit happens and lawyers suck."
Update: I'm persuaded by the arguments some have made against criminalizing malpractice. It's directly analogous to the problem of criminalizing agency costs in the corporate law context, a practice of which I have been critical.
Also, I was amused by the comments of a British medical blogger:
Over in the colonies, a more robust approach has been taken. Not by the government but by the lawyers. Day by day, the USA becomes ever more litigious and the beleaguered medical profession is a coconut-shy for lean, hungry and unsympathetic lawyers ....
Personally, I do think that "shit happens" and I agree entirely (as do some of the commentators on the Professor's website) that, in this context, American lawyers suck.
A "coconut-shy"? Can I get a translation, please? Anyway, Dr Crippenden sounds like a fun guy with whom to split a bottle of claret.
