This is the first posting in what we hope will be both informative and provocative.
Defensive Medicine: Trial lawyers are being accused of causing doctors to engage in defensive medicine. Defensive medicine is performing tests and procedures that are unnecessary. Unnecessary for whom? Not me or you if we are the patients.
It reminds me of the debate over seat belts in cars. The auto industry claimed they were an unnecessary expense for consumers. Today, ask anyone who has been in a head-on crash if they think seat belts are an unnecessary expense.
Similarly, ask any woman who has had her doctor tell her not to worry about the lump in her breast, only to find out too late that she has advance breast cancer, if she thinks a mammogram would have been an unnecessary procedure. Defensive medicine is only defensive medicine if you are not the patient.
Michael J. Quinn, Esq.
