After Med-Mal Caps, Suits Down, Profits Up

From today's Chicago Law Bulletin:

In the two years since Illinois lawmakers set limits on pain-and-suffering damages in medical malpractice cases, lawsuits have declined and profits have risen sharply for the state's largest malpractice insurer.

The caps were instituted after doctors and insurers persuaded members of the General Assembly that skyrocketing malpractice insurance premiums were driving doctors out of some fields of medicine — or out of the state entirely. Jury awards of millions of dollars, they said, were driving up the cost of insurance.

The resulting law limits jury awards of non-economic damages to plaintiffs at $500,000 against doctors and $1 million against hospitals.

But that could change.

Lawyers, physicians and insurance providers are watching a constitutional challenge to the caps, and arguments in the case will be heard next month in Cook County Circuit Court.