Holland & Hart Healthcare Law Blog

Justice Department Issue Special Report On Insurance Claims In Seven States.

            This month the U.S. Department of Justice Bureau of Justice Statistics issued a special report entitled Medical Malpractice Insurance Claims in Seven States, 2000-2004. Thomas H. Cohen, Ph.D., and Kristen A. Hughes, MPA authored the report. This report summarized information on approximately 43,000 closed medical malpractice insurance claims in the states of

Florida

,

Illinois

,

Maine

,

Massachusetts

,

Missouri

,

Nevada

, and

Texas

between 2000 and 2004. The seven states do not collect or report medical malpractice claim data in a uniform or consistent manner, but the findings are interesting and informative.

            

10th Cir. Refuses To Order Forcible Medication on Incompetent Defendant.

Jose Natividad Valenzuela-Puentes is by all accounts a serene and happy man. He is psychotic and out of touch with reality. He is a defendant in a criminal case in New Mexico where he is charged with reentering the United States following his deportion to Mexico after a conviction of an aggravated felony. He was found incompetent to stand trial and was sent to a federal medical facility for four months where he failed to respond to treatment. The federal district court held a hearing on a government motion to forcibly medicate Mr. Valenzuela-Puentes, which he opposed. The trial court ordered that he be medicated and he appealed to the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals. In United States v. Jose Natividad Valenzuela-Puentes, __ F. 3d ___ (10th Cir. 2007), the Tenth Circuit reversed the order and remanded the case to the trial court for further proceedings.

Call 911-Surgical Hospitals Under Attack For Complications At Abilene Hospital.

On February 8, 2007, Sen. Bax Baucus, Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, Sen. Charles Grassley Ranking Member of the Senate Finance Committee and Pete Stark Chairman of the Health Subcommittee of the House Ways and Means Committee sent a joint letter to Leslie V. Norwalk, the Acting Administrator of Centers of Medicare and Medicaid Services asking for an investigation concerning the Medicare status of the West Texas Hospital in Abilene, Texas, which had to call 911 to transport a patient with respiratory arrest related to spinal surgery at the hospital. The patient later died.  The case is reminiscent of a similar case in Oregon about two years ago which was the subject of much debate and outcry by politicians opposed to the development of specialty hospitals.  One of the concerns raised by the three politicians was how the hospital could obtain Medicare provider status during the specialty hospital moratorium. The new hospital apparently came on line during 2005.  The answer just might be that the West Texas Hospital is not in fact a specialty hospital. (It does look like a specialty hospital though and apparently has no emergency room.)