American College of Surgeons - Lobbying Against Their Own Patients

Today I emailed the American College of Surgeons, an organization obviously disappointed with the failure of the medical industry to deprive patients of their constitutional right to have a jury decide the issue of damages in medical negligence cases. The defeated legislation is called the Medical Care Access Protection Act of 2006. The title is sugar coated to disguise its purposes of granting effective immunity to doctors, hospitals, nursing homes and pharmaceutical companies.
The way that I see it, doctors, like lawyers and other professionals are licensed by the state and have some serious responsibilities under the law. One responsibility that we all have is to be truthful. I can truthfully say that I know of no epirical study, no data and no evidence that would justify altering the Constitution to deprive injured patients of their rights. So I figured I would give the American College of Surgeons the opportunity to inform me of the evidence that supports its position. I doubt that I will get an answer. I'll post it on this Blog if I do. Here is my email:

I happened to be perusing the American College of Surgeons web site (http://www.facs.org/index.html) and noted the summary concerning the defeat of S-22 and S-23, two bills pending in Washington that would affect the rights of patients and doctors involved in medical malpractice disputes. The web site invited the reader to contact you to obtain more information and that is what I am doing. Specifically, the entry provides:

The American College of Surgeons supports liability reforms that would guarantee all patients access to necessary surgical services. For more information about the bills and the College’s position, please contact cshalgian@facs.org.

I was wondering if you could provide me with some information that correlates the issue of "access to necessary surgical services" to the legislation that was proposed. As I read the legislation, the common theme of each proposed new federal law was caps on non-economic damages. Yet the caps were proposed at a level that strongly suggested that a patient harmed by medical malpractice had not only suffered a significant injury as a result of malpractice but also that the size or magnitude of the injury was such that substantial damages were warranted. I am confused as to how capping damages would help patients gain access to surgical services under such circumstances. Perhaps you can provide me with some economic studies, malpractice premium analysis or other evidence that demonstrates that capping damages will help patients obtain needed surgical services.

I would also like to know if the American College of Surgeons has analyzed the financial records of the malpractice insurance companies to determine the extent to which the real culprit in this debate is the insurance industry rather than your members' patients.

Thank you for your anticipated response.

Stewart M. Casper
Casper & de Toledo LLC
1458 Bedford St.
Stamford, CT 06905
Tel. (203) 325-8600
Fax (203) 323-5970