Bloomberg News reported earlier this week reported on the US Supreme Court ruling limiting patient lawsuits against manufacturers:
“The U.S. Supreme Court put new limits on lawsuits against Medtronic Inc. and other medical-device makers, saying patients generally can’t sue over products cleared for sale under the most intensive federal review process.”
Several lawmakers promised to fight this ruling… I guess we’ll see what happens!
I wonder if this applies to hospitals as well. I am sure that we as biomeds will still continue to do business as usual, especially when it comes to patient incidents.
Here is the link to the Bloomberg article:
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aA1YD74ZoXLU&refer=home
What do you think? Will this effect us at all?
“The lawsuit accused Medtronic of breaching a warranty on the device and negligently designing, manufacturing and labeling the catheter.
Medtronic said the surgeon didn’t follow guidance on the device’s FDA-approved label not to use the catheter on patients with calcified arteries.”
Finally, after reading the article i found the issue at hand.
Working in medical facilities these 20 odd years, I know that medical professionals do not always follow manufacturer/FDA recommended practices, and when something goes wrong juries tend to award to the patient.
Hopefully this ruling will allow for more questioning on procedure and guidlines followed and ignored.
As with medical insurance companies tightening down on non-payment of preventable damages and infections in hospital, i see this as a positive step.
I have learned from seeing and personal experience that when a doctor says there was a complication, what he is saying is there was a mistake made.