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Being open may avoid lawsuits

Research shows poor communication and lack of access lead to malpractice claims.

By Andis Robeznieks, amednews staff. June 10, 2002.

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Doctors who don't return patients' phone calls or fail to answer questions about errors or unexpected outcomes may be putting themselves at risk for malpractice lawsuits, according to Gerald B. Hickson, MD, vice chair of pediatrics at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn.

"Physicians need to pay equal attention to the technical and nontechnical aspects of a patient's medical care," Dr. Hickson said. "If you ignore these things, you have risk."

Dr. Hickson has spent some 15 years studying the reasons why doctors get sued and, in a report to be published in JAMA this month, he discusses how a physician's risk for generating malpractice suits is influenced by four factors: their specialty, the number of unsolicited complaints they receive, productivity and gender.

He said the study was based on analyzing data from 645 doctors, but his work has since been expanded and replicated to include 6,000 physicians at 11 institutions in a variety of settings, including urban, rural and academic.

The first factor is easy to explain, he said: Statistically, surgeons and obstetricians are sued more than other doctors, so being a surgeon or obstetrician is considered a risk factor.

The second factor is perhaps the most researched and was sparked when Dr. Hickson learned someone had complained about him.

In following up on the complaint, he learned that the office of patient affairs had kept a file on all unsolicited complaints for five years. Analyzing the data, he found that 9% of doctors account for 50% of complaints. [...]