Bernard Black on MedMal Claims

Mirage News – ICLE Academic Affiliate Bernard Black was quoted by Mirage News in a story about his recent co-authored paper on whether past medical malpractice claims are predictive of future claims. You can read full piece here.

“This study shows that even one paid malpractice claim roughly quadruples the likelihood that a physician will face another paid claim in the future. Predictive power increases with the number of paid claims,” said Bernard Black, one of the study’s authors and a professor of law at Northwestern Pritzker School of Law who specializes in health policy research.

Thus, according to Black, physicians with even a single paid claim – and certainly those with two or more claims – could benefit from graduated intervention, such as training and greater oversight, that could reduce future claims and patient harm.