Flea outed. Settles case
A medical liability case against a Massachusetts pediatrician with outstanding training and a great practice was settled before going to trial in mid May. The pediatrician happened to be an extremely successful and much read blogger known as "Flea". Flea had kept his identity private and referred to himself only as "pediatrician in solo practice in the Northeastern US".
Flea gave us excellent thoughts and insights into issues of pediatrics, medicine in general, office practice and into the preparations of a malpractice trial. Insights that thousands of physicians, patients and observers loved. He had very high ratings on Technorati.
Early in his trial his identity as blogger was outed by the plaintiff's attorney. Likely as consequence as that, he settled the next day.
Excuse me for being so naive, but, if I may ask: what on earth does a blog have to do with the case? What does it matter what Flea blogs about the jury, the case, the plans for defense, the plaintiff or the plaintiff's lawyer? What does a blog and the posts in a blog change concerning the question: Did Flea act according to professional standards in the treatment of this particular patient or not? And I believe that that this question, the most important of all, was not answered and will never be answered, because our justice system is not set up to focus on it.
I assume that Flea's attorney settled, because he was concerned that the subjective perception of the defendant by the members of the jury would matter so much that it was not worth continuing with the trial!
I believe this should NOT matter in court. Is that not the reason why we have 12 jurors? To keep things a bit more objective? Have we not learned anything from death sentences in the past that later were determined to be based more on an impression of the character of the defendant than on facts?
I repeat, in my opinion, Flea's blog does not change one bit about his treatment of that particular patient. Call me naive, but a good justice system should dispense justice according to the facts. Right? Not according to things such as "Oh, but he said this and that on such and such date and that makes him bla bla bla". Facts should decide, not gossip, not opinion, not personal impressions.
Sadly, this development confirms exactly what Flea had written in his blog: The jury decides overwhelmingly based on their subjective impression about the defendant! The jury's verdict is to 97% based on personal gut feeling and 3% based on facts! Flea was shockingly right!
Do we have a great justice system or what?
By the way, I personally do not think he presented himself in a bad way at all, at no point. I have a lot of respect for him for opening his heart and mind. But, the old saying it true - and this is not meant in an arrogant way - outsider just do not have the experience to understand what goes on in a physicians heart and mind and should not judge him by what he says privately, by his opinions, by his jokes.
This is just one more reason why the malpractice system needs to be replaced.
I have in past proposed a system similar to "Workman's Comp". You are injured on the job, you fill out a form, you get treated. No lawyers, no courtroom theatrics, no "pain and suffering". Compensation according to an expert opinion and a set table.
What works for the manufacturing industry should work for medicine quite well too.
You are injured during the course of medical treatment. You fill out a claim form, the issue is examined by experts, you are treated. Period. No lawyer drama, no lawyer fees. Reduce it to a bureaucratic act. Fill out form, get treated. Get better.
It should be "Patient's Comp" or in Ob it should be "Mother's Comp". Better, more affordable justice. With our present malpractice / professional liability system, 8% of injured patients reportedly receive compensation. How many receive compensation through workman's comp? Certainly more. Patient's Comp would be a huge improvement.
It would increase reporting of mistakes, since the guilt and shame are gone. It would increase fixing of system errors, since we all would contribute to making systems better. Money spent on liability would actually end up in patients hands instead of lawyer pockets.
Lawyers will not like that. I can see a few bitter comments already...But our patients would be better off.
Posted by Anonymous on Monday April 2nd 2007 as a comment on one of Flea's posts concerning medical malpractice:
"Human nature's a bitch, isn't it? Good doctors get sued, sometimes with little justification; sometimes the get away with an understandable error of judgement that teaches them to be a better doctor, but leaves some poor smuck with a life long problem; bad doctors sometimes get away with it because patients are ignorant of what really happened, or don't want to sue. A recent Harvard (I think) study showed that the "compensation culture" is a myth, as most people who were treated negligently either did not pursue claims, or were unsuccessful, and some people whose cases had no merit won. The system is a mess, but how can it be sorted out?"