The IRE Resource Center is a major research library containing more than 23,250 investigative stories — both print and broadcast. These stories are searchable online or by contacting the Resource Center directly (573-882-3364 or rescntr@ire.org) where a researcher can help you pinpoint what you need. Browse or search the tipsheet section of our library below. Stories are not available for download but can be easily ordered by contacting the Resource Center:
Search results for "malpractice insurance" ...
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Dangerous Doctors
This story profiles four doctors who are frequently sued for malpractice. These doctors practiced surgery while on drugs, abandoned their patients and even left surgical tools inside patients, but they were all lightly disciplined and allowed to continue practicing. Burnett looked into possible means of alleviating the current insurance "crisis," such as harsher discipline for doctors who harm patients. But he found that state medical boards are often too understaffed, underfunded or too ineffectual to be effective monitors of the industry.
Tags: insurance; malpractice; doctors; hospitals; National Practitioner Databank
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Perilous Practices: a three-part series on the medical malpractice issue in Ohio
Political ads have been saying that so many doctors are fleeing Ohio over concerns about rising medical malpractice insurance rates that it has caused a health care crisis, in which the public is losing access to vital services. However, a closer look reveals that the doctor supply has not been dramatically diminished by doctors retiring early or moving away from the state. In fact, the number of doctors holding active Ohio medical licenses went up slightly even as insurance rates were exploding.
Tags: medical malpractice; Ohio State Medical Board; Ohio State Medical Association; Medical Liability Monitor; Ohio Supreme Court; U.S. Department of Human Services; Ohio Department of Insurance; American Medical Association; MD Anderson Cancer Center; UC Medical Center; malpractice fees; malpractice insurance; health benefits
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Injured For Life
Times-Dispatch reporter Bill McKelway was finally able to penetrate the secretive Virginia Birth-related Neurological Injury Program, after years of trying to shed light on one of the most secret institutions in the state. The program was created to help pay compensation for children who suffered brain damage during birth at the hands of doctors and nurses that was "so severe that they never will be able to care for themselves." By paying out claims in secret, the intention was to keep malpractice lawsuits to a minimum and thus malpractice insurance low. But the institution was so secretive that even families involved in the program had no knowledge of each other, and the program claimed for years it was exempt from all open-records and open-meetings laws. However, McKelway was able to slowly gain information on the system, and he wrote dozens of stories on it in 2003 . The resulting reports by the Times-Dispatch revealed a program that was "woefully underfunded, failing to slow the increases in malpractice insurance, as it was designed to do, inconsistent in its application, and aimed at protecting doctors and hospitals more than helping brain-injured babies." In the wake of the reporting, the program's board meetings were made public for the first time in 15 years, and the institution is now subject to Virginia's freedom of information act.
Tags: FOIA; open records; birth; children; babies; baby; brain damage; neurological; nurse; doctor; physician; compensation; secret; malpractice; victim
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"One Big Headache: The collapse of a major medical malpractice insurer has left many feeling sick, and there is no easy cure"
P*I*E Mutual Insurance Co. was founded to offer doctors low premiums on malpractice insurance. But bad accounting and extravagance on the part of its board members took the company down the drain, leaving doctors uninsured and plaintiffs' cases delayed.
Tags: P*I*E Mutual Insurance Co.; P.I.E.; PIE; insurance; doctor; Jacobson Maynard; premium
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Day of the Dead: The declining autopsy rate is hurting medical science
This article discusses the declining rate of autopsies being performed nationwide, and their implications for medical science. "Doctors are reluctant to request them, scared to discover a misdiagnosis that could lead to an expensive malpractice suit. Health maintenance organizations and government agencies are reluctant to pay for them. And there is a shortage of doctors trained to perform them." The article examines the various benefits autopsies offer the medical community -- from measuring the effects of new drugs to understanding various diseases and other health problems, and the possible benefits to families who want to determine just how their loved one died, and from what. The growth of one Los Angeles-based discount autopsy business, 1-800-AUTOPSY, is also discussed.
Tags: autopsy; medical examiner; coroner; HMO; health insurance; science; medical science; death; deceased; organs; research; pathologist; discount business
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Examining Medical Malpractice
A Morning Call investigation of PHICO, a medical malpractice insurer recently put in liquidation, reveals that insurance moves played a major role in drying up the market for malpractice insurance and causing doctors' insurance rates to rise. Doctors and lawyers had accused each other of causing the malpractice insurance crisis, but the Morning Call showed that insurance industry is to blame.
Tags: medical; malpractice; insurance; PHICO; doctors; lawyers; market; increase; skyrocket
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Maim & Blame
Shinkle reports that "the medical profession contended that the welter of 'frivolous' medical malpractice cases and exorbitant damage awards had put doctors under siege and threatened quality medical care." Shinkle says "the concern began after Missouri repealed its charitable immunity law of 1969, opening many hospitals to lawsuits."
Tags: malpractice; medical; doctors; treatment; damage; lawyers; lawsuits; insurance; profits
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The Price of Practice
The Charleston Gazette reviews thousands of malpractice claims filed against doctors in West Virginia from 1993 to 2001. The findings exposed how exaggerated the West Virginia State Medical Association's complaints about "the frequency and severity" of "mostly meritless" claims against doctors were. The series revealed that a major malpractice insurer had a "secret, 120,000-a-year marketing and lobbying agreement" with the medical association.
Tags: lobbyists; lobbying; medicine; insurance; legislature; public health; health care; medical liability; CAR
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The trouble with trocars
A Smart Money investigation examines the risks to patients operated with trocar, "a razor-sharp instrument used in millions of laparoscopic surgeries each year, including hysteroctomies and gall bladder operations." The device is described as a metal spike the doctor forces into the abdomen into the beginning of the surgery, stabbing blindly for a few moments, before a camera can be inserted. The story reveals that many doctors are "alarmed at the numbers of serious injuries and deaths they say are linked to this device." The reporter points to statistics, showing more than 40,000 trocar-related injuries in the last ten years, and reveals an FDA admittance that many injuries go underreported. The force for change now comes from malpractice insurers tired of paying out claims, the magazine finds.
Tags: FDA; medicine; gynecology; malpractice; insurance; health; doctors; surgeons; blood vessels; arteries; Physicians Insurers Association of America; laparoscopy