Federal judge upholds dismissal of Match lawsuit

The plaintiffs plan to take their case to a federal appellate court.

By Myrle Croasdale, AMNews staff. Feb. 14, 2005.

U.S. District Judge Paul Friedman dismissed a request to reconsider his previous August 2004 dismissal of the antitrust lawsuit against the National Resident Matching Program.

The suit, originally filed against the NRMP, its sponsoring organizations and 29 teaching hospitals, claimed that residents' salaries were artificially low and work hours overly long because the structure of the program made it impossible for residents to negotiate these issues.

The decision follows one made in August 2004, when Friedman dismissed Jung et al. v. Assn. of American Medical Colleges et al. after federal legislation passed earlier that summer shielding the Match from the class-action lawsuits and any future antitrust claims.

The plaintiffs have filed a notice to appeal with the U.S. Court of Appeals.

An attorney for the NRMP said it was possible that arguments may be made regarding whether the court acted appropriately in dismissing the class-action suit because of the new legislation, whether the plaintiff had the opportunity to file an amended complaint or whether the NRMP had a right to go into arbitration.

The lawsuit has been an expensive one for the medical establishment, with each individual organization named in the suit hiring antitrust legal counsel, at one point involving more than 100 attorneys in the case. One attorney said costs to the teaching medical establishment were easily more than $20 million.