Dr. Charles A. Bertrand is a heart specialist who for over 20 years has served as an expert witness for plaintiffs, defendants, and as a friend of the court in medical malpractice cases. Highlights of Expert Witness include:
Dr. Bertrand's involvement in cases involving celebrities, such as a member of the Mafia and Tommy Manville, who had 13 wives and was called "The most married man in America."
Dr. Bertrand's first-hand experience with perjury and the way the courts treat it. Obvious perjury is accepted and ignored by plaintiffs, defendants, and judges-each for their own reasons.
Expert Witness discusses how minority attorneys manipulate minority juries by appealing to their prejudices. In one case held in a town known as "a plaintiff's heaven," a minority attorney attacked Dr. Bertrand's credibility on the grounds that the doctor lived in a distant "wealthy" town. Ironically, a few weeks later, when the attorney (who lived near Dr. Bertrand) suffered a heart attack, he requested Dr. Bertrand as his physician!
Expert Witness has some intriguing observations about cross-examination and the difference between how doctors and lawyers approach a problem-a doctor Observes symptoms, makes a diagnosis, and finally prescribes a treatment; a lawyer assumes a conclusion and then looks for evidence to support it.
Based on his experience as a witness, Dr. Bertrand suggests some important reforms in how malpractice cases are handled in the courts. He advocates that judges should select juries, as they do now in federal civil cases, and he also believes that states should adopt the California plan, under which awards for pain and suffering are capped, and attorney's fees are determined on a sliding scale (the higher the award, the lower the percentage for legal fees) and structured awards may be given.
As a physician, Dr. Bertrand has strong feelings about HMOs and the system of Managed Care that serves more than 160 million Americans.
Under 1974 federal law, managed care providers and HMOs cannot be sued for malpractice in state courts and their liability in federal courts are limited. With calls for a "Patients Bill of Rights," and many Americans covered under Managed Care medical insurance programs concerned about the quality of care they are receiving, these restrictions are likely to be removed.
Dr. Bertrand argues that because managed care is prone to malpractice, removal of the limits on malpractice suits will cause the current cost of healthcare to explode.
Malpractice awards currently cost $50 billion annually, and the median award is $500,000. During their medical careers, 90% of all practicing physicians in the United States can expect to be sued for malpractice.
Because managed care contains costs by rationing care; patients served under managed care programs are highly likely to sue for malpractice.
Dr. Bertrand argues that that every citizen should have the right to sue his doctor and that to deny that right to patients in managed care healthcare programs is unacceptable.
What will happen when Congress removes protections against malpractice suits from the managed care industry?
Turmoil in managed care can be expected in the near future until the medical malpractice system itself is reformed, and substitutes for managed care become available, including medical savings plans.
Unlike many other countries, including our northern neighbor, Canada, the United States has been shaped by our American tendency to see things in terms of the law, of rights, and of infringements. This tends to make medical practice extremely costly--to the patient; to the practicing physician, hospitals, and all medical professionals.
Perhaps Expert Witness' hardest-hitting chapter addresses the quality of medical care that so many Americans receive in managed care programs.
Dr. Bertrand argues that the medical care practiced in Health Maintenance Organizations is dangerously prone to malpractice claims.
If American health care is being taxed $50 billion annually for malpractice, what may be done to change the system in ways that will lower costs?
With decades of experience as an expert witness, Dr. Bertrand offers a prescription for reform that will transform a system that has become self-destructive into one that serves patients. His prescription for reform allows, doctors, nurses and hospitals that administer to our health needs, the freedom to practice without the threat of frivolous malpractice claims and gives every patient the right to sue, even if their provider is an HMO.
Often the simplest answers are the best, and these reforms could make the difference between reasonable costs and the decline of medical care that is occurring as a result of medical malpractice awards.
