I get many calls from people seeking compensation against a doctor or other health care provider for medical malpractice or negligence. Common scenarios these callers have experienced include a doctor’s failure to diagnose or properly treat an illness, and mistakes made during surgery.
Some callers are frustrated because they cannot find an attorney willing to take their case. But just because an attorney will not take your case does not necessarily mean that you were not wronged or harmed. It might mean that the damages you suffered are not severe enough to make the case economically practical.
In Ohio (and many other states), there is a legal cap on non-economic damages for medical malpractice which arise out of the acts or omissions of a medical provider. Non-economic damages are more commonly referred to as damages for “pain and suffering.” The basic cap is the larger of $250,000 – or three times economic damages. These are subject to a maximum of $350,000 per plaintiff and a maximum of $500,000 per occurrence. These maximums increase to $500,000 per plaintiff and $1 million per occurrence if the plaintiff has suffered permanent and substantial physical deformity, loss of use of a limb, loss of a bodily organ system, or a permanent physical injury that prevents them from caring for themselves. As reflected in the Ohio Rev. Code Ann. § 2323.43, this law was enacted in order to protect medical professionals from exorbitant jury awards.
Is it worth suing?
What this legal cap on damages means is that plaintiffs are seriously limited in the amount of compensation they can recover by suing a medical provider, unless they have a permanent and substantial physical deformity (e.g., severed limb), or their injuries result in their death. Knowing that plaintiffs must overcome this hurdle, hospitals and doctors are more likely to take cases all the way to trial rather than settle them out of court. This is because their attorneys know that the costs to the plaintiffs will often not justify the eventual award. Plaintiffs and their attorneys run the risk of getting no compensation whatsoever after they pay for litigation costs and medical bills. In other words, the ends may not justify the means. Attorneys’ clients will end up with very little money in their pockets, and will be disappointed.
This is truly unfortunate for people who have indeed been harmed by health care providers, but have either recovered their health, or not suffered what the courts consider “permanent and substantial physical deformity.” Often, clients will ask “so, the doctor can just get away with this?” The answer is both yes and no. People can can always report the health care provider to the licensing board that oversee their activities. Once a licensing board receives a report, they may hold an investigation, discipline the health care provider, or take away their license to practice. However, as of this posting, medical providers CAN avoid paying compensation to an injured plaintiff based upon the current laws, which more assertively support the medical professionals instead of their patients.
