Posted On: March 22, 2005, 1:44 pm CST

Posted By: Bob

I don't doubt for a minute that plaintiff attorneys could devise strategies for inflating economic damages when confronted with caps on noneconomic damages. Nor do I doubt that juries would respond to a sympathetic plaintiff by willfully blurring the distinction between economic and noneconomic damages, in order to achieve what they regard as a just outcome.

In addition to the two ways in which the article says legislatures might respond to this phenomenon -- either place caps on total compensation, or give up on caps altogether -- there is another way they could go: establish special medical liability courts, which would operate like other specialized administrative courts dedicated to specific areas of law (e.g., bankruptcy). They would be presided over by specially trained judges, use certified, court-appointed expert witnesses, eschew juries, and require judges to explain their decisions in the form of written opinions.

After reading this article, that option looks increasingly attractive to me.