Doctor held liable for punitives for treating patient competently

From Point of Law.com

"I don't usually post about trial court decisions -- they have a high
variance, that is typically narrowed on appeal. They are often the
fodder for demagogic politicians of every stripe. I usually take them
with multiple grains of salt.

But this New Jersey Law Journal report is, I think, worthy of larger
notice. It describes a jury verdict from Hudson County, for $400,000,
against a physician who treated his patient competently.

His failing was to refuse to hire, at his own expense, an interpreter
so that he could adequately communicate with his deaf patient.

Why didn't the patient come with her own interpreter (hired at her
own expense)? Because she doesn't have to, according to federal law
as interpreted by the courts. Her lack of verbal skills is a
disability that others must palliate at their expense.

More obscene still is that the defendant's malpractice liability
insurance does not usually cover such liability, because the care
actually given to the patient was quite appropriate.

The plaintiff claimed that she repeatedly asked her Jersey City
rheumatologist to hire an American Sign Language interpreter. The
doctor responded that as a solo practitioner, he couldn't afford the
estimated $150 to $200 per visit an interpreter would cost, given
that Medicare paid him $49 for each visit.

He treated his patient (who declined to visit another rheumatologist,
perhaps one who knew American sign language) for lupus for about 20
visits, stretched out over 20 months, occasionally exchanging written
words with the patient's civil union partner [wait: if they were
lovers, how come the partner didn't understand and use American sign
language?] or verbal instructions via the "couple's" 9-year-old
daughter (who apparently couldn't use sign language either -- it just
gets stranger and stranger).

But the patient claimed she never really understood the side-effects
(swelling of her treatment), and that when she insisted the doctor
was obliged to pay for an interpreter (she had an interpreter phone
the doctor, self-serving legal advice if ever any has been
dispensed), the doctor became angry and insulted her, forcing her to
seek treatment elsewhere.

Her next doctor was able to communicate with her, and ceased the
treatment, since it turned out that the patient didn't want the
swelling and preferred a different treatment.

Essentially her lawsuit sounds in battery (touching of a patient
despite the lack of informed consent) -- fine, except that the
patient apparently was advised to seek out other providers and
insisted on returning time and again to this one.

I'm not excusing poor bedside manner or countenancing insults (though
I have no evidence that any insults were uttered) --

During a three-week trial (!), the rheumatologist's argument that it
would have been an undue hardship to pay an interpreter who cost more
than the income he received for each visit was apparently undercut by
the fact that the doctor's tax returns showed he earned over $400,000
a year.

Sorry, but how did this evidence get in? Unless the doctor is obliged
to treat handicapped people at a loss, why is his personal wealth
relevant here?

The jury obviously doesn't share my disbelief. Fully half of the
$400,000 verdict against the doctor was for punitive damages. To
repeat, the sum is not insurable, apparently.

So, notice to all professionals out there: don't get wealthy, or you
may be obliged to "share the wealth" with a disabled person.

Can't professionals post a sign in their office that reads "Sorry, we
decline to treat you if we must spend more money on your visit than
you or your agents will pay us"?

Apparently the answer is "Yes, such a sign is OK if the patient
speaks only Slovak (since that is not a "disability", at least not
yet), but not if the patient is blind or deaf.

http://www.pointoflaw.com/archives/2008/10/doctor-held-lia.php