Tort Reform and Physician Supply

While we noted with some interest the article about defensive medicine published in teh June 1st issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), another item in that same issue also has a pertinence to our practice. Full text access to the web-based version of JAMA is restricted to subscribers, but you can read the abstract (excerpted below) by folloing this link.

"Impact of Malpractice Reforms on the Supply of Physician Services"

The adoption of "direct" malpractice reforms led to greater growth in the overall supply of physicians. Three years after adoption, direct reforms increased physician supply by 3.3%, controlling for fixed differences across states, population, states’ health care market and political characteristics, and other differences in malpractice law. Direct reforms had a larger effect on the supply of nongroup vs group physicians, on the supply of most (but not all) specialties with high malpractice insurance premiums, on states with high levels of managed care, and on supply through retirements and entries than through the propensity of physicians to move between states. Direct reforms had similar effects on less experienced and more experienced physicians.