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Nevada Supreme Court to decide limit of obstetrician's liability

Physicians say the case may indicate whether constitutional challenges to the state's current medical liability reforms will arise.

By Amy Lynn Sorrel, amednews staff. March 13, 2006.

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Nevada obstetrician Adam Levy, MD, doesn't know whether he will have to pay $300,000 or $5 million for a jury verdict against him.

The state Supreme Court will decide after having heard his appeal in February. Dr. Levy is challenging a lower court interpretation of 1987 and 1989 state tort reforms. He says the laws should limit his liability to $300,000, but the lower court disagreed.

The Nevada State Medical Assn. says the outcome of the case could be an indicator of how the courts will interpret more recent 2002 legislative reforms designed to hold doctors financially responsible for a proportion similar to their share of fault in medical liability cases.

In the case before the high court, a Clark County jury in 2001 awarded $6 million to patient Howard Watts, who was born brain-damaged in 1995. A jury found Dr. Levy and Kenneth Turner, MD, a Las Vegas obstetrician-gynecologist, each 5% responsible for the injury. It found the St. Ana Birthing Center 90% responsible.

The birthing center did not have insurance and went out of business. Dr. Turner settled for $1 million. Now the lower court is holding Dr. Levy liable for the remainder of the award under an old 1977 joint and several liability statute.

The lower court said that the 1977 statute does not limit physicians' monetary responsibility proportional to the part they contributed to an injury occurring.

But Dr. Levy is asking the Supreme Court to rule that he is responsible for only his portion of the damages, arguing that the Legislature enacted reforms in 1989 that intended several liability for doctors in medical liability cases, which physicians say the courts have continued to ignore.