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A comment on Can the insurance company send investigators out to spy on me ?

Mike Bryant — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 19:34:59 GMT

It is an amazing violation of privay. You are so right with the advice for them to call the police. But, on top of everything they need to not lie. These invaders are only affective when they catch someone doing something they said they have not or later deny. People need to live their lives, but be safe and alert.

A comment on NTSB Recognizes Need to Better Monitor Truck Driver Fatigue

redladyca — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 14:21:51 GMT

Basically the difference between a convicted felon and a truck driver is that the convicted felon gets three hot meals a day cable TV, recreation time and an 8' X 10' cell.

Truckers have to work and pay for everything (it's always more expensive at a truck stop, because it's usually the only place we can park a big truck and they know it and take advantage ) We get no cable, no recreation time maybe 1 hot meal a day, usually it's every other day and fast food (that we have to pay for!!) and live in an 8' X 5' box on wheels that is our office.

We also get told we're number one on an almost daily basis (flipped the bird) but without trucks there would be no fuel at the gas stations, or food in the grocery stores.

Did you know that driving a Big Rig is more dangerous than being a law enforcement officer and that it shortens our expected life span by an average of 15 years???

A comment on NTSB Recognizes Need to Better Monitor Truck Driver Fatigue

redladyca — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 11:24:34 GMT

It's more like slaves. I've waited between 14 to 36 hours at a shipper to get loaded with no facilities food or water (other than what I have in the truck) only to have the company dispatcher order me to give it to a team and I loose all the miles/ pay for the load. Now I know my company charged that shipper for detention but then they tell me that the contract with the shipper is that they do not pay detention. At the very best I might get $8 an hour detention but when i'm rolling I make $30 an hour. Do the math that's $22 an hour I lose.
They do not get you home when you ask even when given weeks notice. Then we only get 1 day off for every 6 days on the road not 2 out of every 7.
Don't get me wrong I love what I do but I'm a professional and deserve to be paid as such. Would you really want your family on the road anywhere near a 18 wheeler that was driven by an untrained/ unskilled hand?? This country would come to a complete stop were it not for the truckers on the road every day. Can you think of anything in your home that has not at some point been on a truck?

A comment on NTSB Recognizes Need to Better Monitor Truck Driver Fatigue

michael phelan — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 11:07:25 GMT

redladyca makes an excellent point. The trucking companies treat the drivers like indentured servants and force them to choose between adequate rest and making a fair living.

A comment on NTSB Recognizes Need to Better Monitor Truck Driver Fatigue

redladyca — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 10:59:06 GMT

the best way to eliminate driver fatigue is to change the way the industry pays drivers. Throw the cents per mile game out the window and pay them by the hour or on salary thereby eliminating the use of multipal log books by many drivers (illegal) so they can run as many miles as possible and make as much money as possible. Every minute they spend at a shipper or receiver and in a dock is an income loss to a driver

A comment on Database of Medical Malpractice Unavailable to the Public

Jim O'Hare AIC AIS VP med mal claims — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 14:01:21 GMT

How do you know if someone is good whether attorney, plumber or doctor?. Tough call. Just relying on state reports, the dept of Health or angies list, is not effective and are poor measuring tools.

Your best assessment is to meet with the Doc and see if he has time for you and communicates. An administrative personality has been found to be preferable to an entrepeneurial personality as an insurance risk. The gunslinger approach we avoid. Educational pedigree or country of training has been found to be relatively unimportant.

If I ever needed complex cardiac surgery, the physician that I would select, would never be chosen by a lay person, strictly based on the amount of litigation in his jacket. This Doc is a gifted surgeon that takes the cases others avoid. If you just rely on state reports you would be making the biggest mistake of your life.

Word of mouth and asking questions are your best bets. How many of these surgeries have you done? etc. Do you connect with the doc and are your questions and expectations crystal clear prior to retention.

You would be totally surprised at what factors prove to be a great insurance risk. 88% of cases are caused by 14% of the docs. Be an educated consummer.

A comment on Database of Medical Malpractice Unavailable to the Public

Kathleen Cunningham — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 11:48:37 GMT

I understand the reasons for the AMA wanting to keep the information from the public, but investigating a physician through the medical board or the Federation of State Medical Boards is simply not enough. If you look at the members of these boards with disciplinary authority, you will see that the vast majority are physicians. We all know that docs are not very good at policing each other. Very few lay people sit on these boards. Physicians who have a disciplinary action, license revcation, suspension or limitation listed with the state medical board, usually have had consequences of unethical or criminal behavior, not poor quality care.

I find that the information available on state medical board websites/directories is not sufficient to get a full picture of a physician. Just because a physician has no disciplinary actions listed with the board does not mean that he/she is a good physician. In this business we have all known of cases of incompetent and potentially dangerous doctors looking clean as a whistle on their state medical board pages.

In order for consumers to make informed choices regarding a care provider, they clearly need more information than what is currently available to the public.

A comment on Database of Medical Malpractice Unavailable to the Public

Robert Oshel — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 11:19:02 GMT

Concerning Mr. O'Hare's comment about malpractice insurance companies having little access to the National Practitioner Data Bank and that it would be useful if they could see reports, he is correct that malpractice insurers are not permitted to query the NPDB.

However, there is nothing in law or regulations that prevent malpractice insurers from requiring that applicants for insurance provide them with a copy of the results of an NPDB self-query. Physicians can get a copy of their own NPDB record (or a confirmation that they don't have any reports) at any time, and they can give this information to insurers. So if Mr. O'Hare's company wants NPDB information, it can get it, but indirectly through its insureds or applicants.

A comment on Database of Medical Malpractice Unavailable to the Public

Jim O'Hare AIC AIS VP med mal claims — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 10:19:08 GMT

The data bank was a good idea way back when, to keep docs from moving from state to state after wearing out there litigation welcome in state "A", only to continue bad medicine in another state. In 25 years of adjusting med mal claims , I have only paid the aggregate policy on 3 docs, all three plastics docs. They ran away, got out of dodge and started over in a far away state. The data bank caught two of these guys and the third retired. It worked. Asking for more is tricky.
Working with a med mal insurance company, I have very little access to the data bank other than reporting. It would be great if I could explore other reports to weed out prospective bad insurance risks. Many physicians would not be able to find coverage if we were allowed to do this. So I understand the reasons for limited access. Allowing access to the public would have those with little info on a subject, warp that info into something larger. We all know the dangers of acting strongly with a perceived understanding based on a little bit of info. Iraq for a poor example. Keeping the Data bank around to keep vagabond bad docs from hurting people nationwide should be enough. Check for state reporting if you want to investigate a treater. Unfortunately, i have had to report many docs to the data bank that did not belong there. That may sound goofy to many from the plaintiffs bar, but consider the many times that you have accepted money from a carrier for a non target defendant physician, when you had very little liability or causation, but maybe big damages and a sympathetic witness. Those docs get into the Data bank and can never get out. regards Jim

A comment on Experts Not Permitted to Testify Plaintiff is Faking or Exaggerating Symptoms

Mike Bryant — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 05:55:18 GMT

Pain is physiological, that is always the thing that this paid for medical defense tactic misses or ignores. It is nice to see a court recognize the defense for what it is. Thanks for pointing this important case out.