Georgia Personal Injury Law Blog : Atlanta Georgia Injury Lawyer & Attorney : Jason R. Schultz Law Firm : Wrongful Death, Malpractice, Car Accidents : Georgia

Joy in Whoville!  A great victory for those Georgians who have been, and who will be in the future, seriously injured due to medical negligence.  Today, the Georgia Supreme Court unanimously declared caps on damage awards for medical malpractice cases to be unconstitutional.

The Supreme Court found that the $350,000 cap imposed by the Legislature in 2005 violates the right to a jury trial as guaranteed under the Georgia Constitution.  The tort reform law "clearly nullifies the jury's findings of fact regarding damages and thereby undermines the jury's basic function," Justice Hunstein wrote for the Court. "Consequently, we are compelled to conclude that the caps infringe on a party's constitutional right."

Atlanta lawyer Adam Malone, who represented the victim at trial, applauded the court's decision. "The bedrock of our democracy depends upon our ability to self govern at the ballot box and in the jury box," Malone said. "Any attempt by the government to invade either is an assault on what separates America from the rest of the world."

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Attorneys for a woman who suffered severe facial disfigurement as a result of a botched cosmetic surgery procedure have told the Georgia Supreme Court about the unfairness and injustice of tort reform laws that cap medical malpractice damages.

In 2005, enthusiastic lawmakers cheered on by vested interests, including health care companies and insurers, passed sweeping reform laws that limited the non-economic damages that an injured patient could receive at $350,000. Non-economic damages include those for physical and mental pain and suffering and diminishment of the quality of one’s life. Since the law was passed, hundreds of patients who have suffered serious injuries from the negligence of their health care professionals, including doctors and nurses, have had their recovery options limited.

One of those patients, Betty Nestlehutt, visited an Atlanta cosmetic surgeon for a facelift. The results of that surgery illustrate how important it is that doctors continue to be held fully accountable to their patient’s for their negligence. Nestlehutt’s skin was left severely disfigured, and even after extensive treatment, continues to be scarred.

A Fulton county jury returned a verdict of $115,000 for her medical expenses and $1.15 million in non-economic damages. The facility, where the surgery was performed, appealed against the verdict. This week, the Supreme Court heard an appeal, and will decide whether placing caps on damages in medical malpractice cases is unconstitutional in Georgia.

This is definitely a case that has been closely followed by injured patients, safety advocates and Fulton County Georgia medical malpractice lawyers . For four years, we have waited and watched frustrated, as the cap severely restricted the rights of victims injured by medical negligence.  Medical malpractice lawsuits are notoriously expensive to litigate, and when damages are capped, it's makes it economically infeasible to pursue a number of meritorious claims for injured patients. The cap limits the rights of ordinary citizens in Georgia and we hope that the Supreme Court will uphold the Georgia Constitution and strike down the cap.

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A medical malpractice case which has implications for future lawsuits brought in Georgia headed to the Supreme Court last month. The case involved four doctors who were cleared of negligence in the treatment of a child diagnosed with Rocky Mountain spotted fever. 

Justin Smith contracted the infectious disease in 2003. He was 13 at the time. The four doctors failed to diagnose his symptoms and he was later rushed to Children's Healthcare of Atlanta at Egleston. By the time he was correctly diagnosed and treated, he had already suffered some amount of brain damage.

His parents sued the doctors for $3.8 million, but the four physicians were cleared of all charges by a jury. The doctors were able to prove that since the disease is so rare, they were unable to diagnose the symptoms correctly. Lawyers for the doctors also argued that there had been no permanent damage to the boy's health. Now, the Supreme Court gets to decide if a hindsight instruction given to the jury during that trial was error and whether is affected the outcome of the case. The family's lawyer has argued that the hindsight jury instruction should only be given if there was no information available to the physician at the time. The family claimed that the doctors knew about the tick bite and that that should have been sufficient to constitute foreseeability that some injury would result if their son was not treated. The doctors' lawyers insist that the hallmark sign of the disease, rashes, were not present when the child was brought to them for treatment. 

Medical Malpractice Lawyers

Pursuing medical malpractice claims can be a time consuming and complex process, requiring the expertise of an Atlanta medical malpractice lawyer who has years of experience litigating claims and recovering damages for injured patients. If you have been injured as the result of the negligence of a doctor or other healthcare provider, contact a Georgia medical malpractice lawyer  at my office for a free consultation.

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