SFMS/CMA Prevents Last Minute Move To Scuttle MICRA; MICRA Is Preserved September 4, 2012 Advocacy, MICRA, Politics and Medicine SB 1528, MICRA 0 In the last days of the 2012 legislative session, a shell bill (SB 1528) was gutted and amended in an attempt by trial lawyers to undermine California’s Medical Injury Compensation Reform Act (MICRA). SFMS/CMA rallied its grassroots advocacy network and was able to thwart this move and the bill is dead for this legislative season. The bill would have artificially inflated the medical expense damages by valuing them on the basis of the retail price of medical services provided, not the actual expense to the injured party. Simply put, this would allow trial lawyers to value medical expenses based on usual and customary fees that physicians are rarely are paid, not the discounted contract rates they receive. The legislation would have scrapped longstanding principals of law that allows an injured person to recover as economic medical expense damages only amounts actually paid or incurred for medical care and services. A similar assault was mounted last year in the form of a lawsuit (Howell v. Hamilton Meats) brought before the California Supreme Court. Fortunately, the court ruled that an injured person is not entitled to recover economic damages for past medical expenses based on a provider’s undiscounted bill if that sum that was never paid by or on behalf of the injured person. SB 1528 would have artificially inflated economic medical expense damage awards and undermined MICRA's intent to prevent double recovery of these damages. This, in turn, would have increased medical malpractice premiums for physicians, many of whom would be forced to close shop thereby further limiting access to care for all Californians. Had this bill passed, it would have undermined the state's landmark MICRA law, which was signed by Gov. Brown in 1975 (during his first term as governor) and limits pain and suffering damages in medical malpractice cases to $250,000. Comments are closed.
