Medical malpractice is professional negligence by act or omission by a health care provider in which the treatment provided falls below the accepted standard of practice in the medical community and causes injury or death to the patient, with most cases involving medical error. Claims of medical malpractice, when pursued in US courts, are processed as civil torts. Sometimes an act of medical malpractice will also constitute a criminal act, as in the case of the death of Michael Jackson.
The term managed care or managed healthcare is used in the United States to describe a group of activities intended to reduce the cost of providing health care and providing American health insurance while improving the quality of that care. It has become the predominant system of delivering and receiving American health care since its implementation in the early 1980s, and has been largely unaffected by the Affordable Care Act of 2010.
...intended to reduce unnecessary health care costs through a variety of mechanisms, including: economic incentives for physicians and patients to select less costly forms of care; programs for reviewing the medical necessity of specific services; increased beneficiary cost sharing; controls on inpatient admissions and lengths of stay; the establishment of cost-sharing incentives for outpatient surgery; selective contracting with health care providers; and the intensive management of high-cost health care cases. The programs may be provided in a variety of settings, such as Health Maintenance Organizations and Preferred Provider Organizations.
Directors and officers liability insurance is liability insurance payable to the directors and officers of a company, or to the organization itself, as indemnification (reimbursement) for losses or advancement of defense costs in the event an insured suffers such a loss as a result of a legal action brought for alleged wrongful acts in their capacity as directors and officers. Such coverage may extend to defense costs arising from criminal and regulatory investigations or trials as well; in fact, often civil and criminal actions are brought against directors and officers simultaneously. Intentional illegal acts, however, are typically not covered under D&O policies.
Defensive medicine, also called defensive medical decision making, refers to the practice of recommending a diagnostic test or medical treatment that is not necessarily the best option for the patient, but mainly serves to protect the physician against the patient as potential plaintiff. Defensive medicine is a reaction to the rising costs of malpractice insurance premiums and patients’ biases on suing for missed or delayed diagnosis or treatment but not for being overdiagnosed.
Tokio Marine HCC is an international specialty insurance group with offices across the United States, the United Kingdom, Spain, and Ireland. The company is based in Houston, Texas, U.S.A. but has major offices in Atlanta, Barcelona, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Detroit, Farmington (CT), Frederick (MD), Ireland, Leicester (UK), London, Los Angeles, Madrid, Mount Kisco (NY), and New York City.
Tort reform consists of changes in the civil justice system in common law countries that aim to reduce the ability of plaintiffs to bring tort litigation or to reduce damages they can receive. Such changes are generally justified under the grounds that litigation is an inefficient means to compensate plaintiffs; that tort law permits frivolous or otherwise undesirable litigation to crowd the court system; or that the fear of litigation can serve to curtail innovation, raise the cost of consumer goods or insurance premiums for suppliers of services, and increase legal costs for businesses. Tort reform has primarily been prominent in common law jurisdictions, where criticism of judge-made rules regarding tort actions manifests in calls for statutory reform by the legislature.
The Canadian Medical Protective Association (CMPA) is a membership-based, not-for-profit organization that provides legal defense, liability protection, and risk-management education for physicians in Canada. The CMPA also provides compensation to patients and their families proven to have been harmed by negligent medical care. In 2016, the CMPA's membership list totaled 95,691 physicians.
The Healthcare Quality Improvement Act of 1986 (HCQIA) was introduced by Congressman Ron Wyden from Oregon.
Professional liability insurance (PLI), also called professional indemnity insurance (PII) but more commonly known as errors & omissions (E&O) in the US, is a form of liability insurance which helps protect professional advising, consulting, and service-providing individuals and companies from bearing the full cost of defending against a negligence claim made by a client in a civil lawsuit. The coverage focuses on alleged failure to perform on the part of, financial loss caused by, and error or omission in the service or product sold by the policyholder. These are causes for legal action that would not be covered by a more general liability insurance policy which addresses more direct forms of harm. Professional liability insurance may take on different forms and names depending on the profession, especially medical and legal, and is sometimes required under contract by other businesses that are the beneficiaries of the advice or service.
ProAssurance Corporation, headquartered in Birmingham, Alabama, is a property and casualty company that sells professional liability insurance to doctors. The company was founded in 1976 as Mutual Assurance and was later renamed to Medical Assurance in 1997. The name "ProAssurance" was created in 2001 when Medical Assurance merged with Professionals Group. The company is currently the fourth largest medical professional liability insurance writer and has over $6 billion in assets.
The healthcare reform debate in the United States has been a political issue focusing upon increasing medical coverage, decreasing costs, insurance reform, and the philosophy of its provision, funding, and government involvement.
There were a number of different health care reforms proposed during the Obama administration. Key reforms address cost and coverage and include obesity, prevention and treatment of chronic conditions, defensive medicine or tort reform, incentives that reward more care instead of better care, redundant payment systems, tax policy, rationing, a shortage of doctors and nurses, intervention vs. hospice, fraud, and use of imaging technology, among others.
MedMal Direct Insurance Company is a direct-write medical malpractice insurance company headquartered in Jacksonville, Florida. MedMal Direct Insurance does not use independent brokers, but rather sells insurance coverage direct to the physicians through sales representatives, website, and direct marketing. The company provides medical professional liability insurance, regulatory compliance protection, and cyber-liability coverage directly to healthcare providers and healthcare facilities.
The Doctors Company is a medical malpractice insurance company headquartered outside Napa, California, USA.
Scott B. Ransom has worked across the healthcare ecosystem as a physician, researcher, teacher, author, executive, strategy consultant and investor.
Medical law is the branch of law which concerns the prerogatives and responsibilities of medical professionals and the rights of the patient. It should not be confused with medical jurisprudence, which is a branch of medicine, rather than a branch of law.
Credentialing is the process of establishing the qualifications of licensed medical professionals and assessing their background and legitimacy.
In Australia, it is a mandatory requirement for registered healthcare practitioners to hold appropriate medical indemnity insurance coverage for healthcare practices in Australia. Medical indemnity is a form of professional indemnity coverage defined by Australian legislation – the Medical Indemnity Act 2003 and is a type of general insurance. In the United Kingdom, this type of professional indemnity for healthcare practitioners is generally referred to as ‘professional indemnity’ and in the United States, medical negligence insurance. In Australia, the term medical indemnity can be used to refer to all healthcare indemnity, not just that provided for medical doctors. However, there are only six Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Authority (AHPRA) listed insurers that provide medical indemnity insurance cover to medical practitioners. Australian medical practitioner medical indemnity providers include:
Medical malpractice is a legal cause of action that occurs when a medical or health care professional, through a negligent act or omission, deviates from standards in their profession, thereby causing injury or death to a patient. The negligence might arise from errors in diagnosis, treatment, aftercare or health management.
Optum, Inc. is an American healthcare services provider with business interests encompassing technology and related services, pharmacy care services and various direct healthcare services. It has been a subsidiary of UnitedHealth Group since 2011. UHG formed Optum by merging its existing pharmacy and care delivery services into the single Optum brand, comprising three main businesses: OptumHealth, OptumInsight and OptumRx. In 2017, Optum accounted for 44 percent of UnitedHealth Group's profits and as of 2019, Optum's revenues have surpassed $100 billion. Also in early 2019, Optum gained significant media attention regarding a trade secrets lawsuit that the company filed against former executive David William Smith, after Smith left Optum to join Haven, the joint healthcare venture of Amazon, JPMorgan Chase, and Berkshire Hathaway.
