No fault insurance proposed in the face of rising claims

A "NO FAULT" compensation scheme is being proposed by the SA Medical Association, to help victims of medical negligence in the face of skyrocketing medico-legal claims.

The association's chairman, Dr Mzukisi Grootboom, said the fund would reduce an expensive and "rising tide" of pending claims against doctors. While such a compensation fund would not affect legitimate medical negligence claims, Grootboom said it would compensate patients who fell victim to unavoidable adverse events, through no fault of their physicians.

He said that identifying and compassionately addressing genuinely unavoidable accidents and adverse outcomes, while teaching doctors to communicate openly and honestly with their patients, would help reduce the expensive - and rising - tide of pending claims.

He was responding to a public debate which has ensued in medical and legal circles following criticism of rising legal claims against the health sector led by Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi. Last week, Motsoaledi hit out at lawyers and certain doctors for being "pocket liners", saying some lawyers had left courts for hospitals and were targeting certain specialities. Addressing the country's first medico-legal summit in Pretoria, Motsoaledi said the country was experiencing an explosion in medical malpractice litigation.

Grootboom acknowledged that a number of factors could be contributing to the rising litigation, such as a shortage of specialists, poor supervision of junior doctors, and a lack of necessary nursing skills, equipment and drugs. However, he said that should the compensation scheme come to fruition it would limit legal costs for provincial health departments and private practitioners by reducing the number of court cases.

Cape Argus, 20 March 2015