No medical malpractice caps for now

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Efforts to limit what jurors can award victims of medical malpractice are dead, at least for this year.

Sen. John Huppenthal, R-Chandler, who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee and is sponsoring SCR 1035, yanked the measure from consideration Monday by his own panel amid questions of whether it could get approval from the Legislature—or, ultimately, the voters who would have to ratify it.

Huppenthal promised to reintroduce the measure next year, saying the additional time will allow proponents to conduct “focus groups” to determine what would be saleable to the public.

The Arizona Medical Association, which is pushing the proposal, wants a $250,000 limit on what victims of malpractice can collect in non-economic damages. That ranges from awards to compensate victims for their pain and suffering to how much should be imposed in penalties against those whose acts a jury considers to be outrageous.

But Sen. Carolyn Allen, R-Scottsdale, questioned whether legislators or voters would accept a cap that low. She suggested $500,000 might be more appropriate.

There is another option: Give the Legislature permission to set the limits.

But similar proposals without a specific number have been defeated at the polls multiple times in the last two decades.

Monday’s action does not end the debate. Chic Older, executive vice president of the Arizona Medical Association, said it can be brought back next session in time to put it on the 2006 ballot.

Older acknowledged that legislative approval of any plan is far from a sure thing. That, he said, might force his association to take its case to the streets.

A decision on that would have to come early next year: It takes 182,917 valid signatures to put a constitutional amendment on the ballot.

Wes Cleveland, director of state legislation of the American Medical Association, told lawmakers caps are needed to keep medical care affordable.

Sen. Bill Brotherton, D-Phoenix, noted the caps would affect things that can’t be quantified but yet may be real. For example, he said, a retiree who can no longer play golf due to a doctor’s error would have no economic loss.

Brotherton then made the question more personal, asking Cleveland what he should get if a doctor’s actions left him impotent. Cleveland did not answer directly, suggesting lawmakers instead need to look “at the totality of what is the public good.”

Jim Carland, a former Mesa pediatrician who now is president of the Mutual Insurance Company of Arizona, said the doctor-owned company pays out more in claims than it collects in premiums.

What has helped make that up in the past, Carland said, has been interest earned on investing the premiums which are set aside to take care of future claims. But the decline in interest rates has forced sharp premium hikes.

Carland said a $250,000 cap would cut payouts by anywhere from 7 to 25 percent.

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