Did They Deserve to Get Sued? How Malpractice Suits Change Doctors

Patients can, and should, make use of the capability to bring a lawsuit against a physician when the situation requires it. What's astonishing is how frequently these lawsuits are a complete surprise to the doctor.

Medscape’s recent Internal Medicine Malpractice Report noted 74% of physicians who are named in a medical malpractice lawsuit say they were blind-sided by the notification.  Only 24% thought a suit might be coming and only 1% said they were certain a patient would sue.

The surprise may come because specialized physicians may only see the patient for a short period of time and have very little interaction with them aside from a single evaluation before the patient returns to a primary care physician. Thus, they might have no idea how the patient is doing. Some patients go directly to a suit without communicating with the doctor first. In other instances, the doctor may just miss the signals of an impending lawsuit.  In other cases, the patient may simply go directly to a lawsuit without communicating with the physician at all.

Does a malpractice lawsuit change a doctor? Even if the suit is dismissed, the process can be quite stressful and can take years to be resolved. Most physicians continue to see patients during the process. According to the Medscape study, about 30% of doctors said after a suit was filed against them, they stopped trusting their patients. It's understandable that a natural response to getting sued is practicing more defensive medicine.

Legal action must remain an option, however it ought to be the final recourse when nothing else has brought a remedy that is reasonable. Physicians need to trust their patients just as patients need to trust their doctors.

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