0:00

So wrapping this up, the few takeaways of the following,

0:06

if you get sued, report it immediately.

0:09

Do you don't have time to waste? Make that call.

0:12

Get the ball rolling.

0:14

And likewise, if you get word ahead of time

0:17

or if you realize that you've made a mistake,

0:19

or you know, you get called by another clinician who says,

0:23

Hey, I just did a read on a case

0:25

that you missed something x amount of time ago, call your,

0:29

call your insurance carrier and report it.

0:31

Let them know. Put it on the radar screen.

0:34

Um, get that you're, you know, you're pretty quickly,

0:36

you're gonna have an attorney assigned after that happens.

0:40

You need to do an analysis of whether or not you would like

0:44

or need to have personal counsel.

0:47

Um, then I'm gonna encourage you

0:49

to be actively involved in the litigation process.

0:52

Work with your lawyer, understand the case, understand

0:57

what your rights are in the case,

0:59

and just be engaged in the process.

1:02

And then you need to, um, ask yourself the question,

1:06

is this a case that can or should be resolved?

1:10

And this is a, uh, it gets back to some of

1:12

what Davis talked about, which is, you know, there's a lot

1:15

of expectations on you to be perfect, but nobody's perfect.

1:18

And you can be perfect 99.9% of the time,

1:21

and that 0.01% of the time, um, there's a mistake made.

1:26

You're human, we make mistakes,

1:28

and that's why you have malpractice insurance.

1:31

And the same way that you're human

1:34

and we all make mistakes, people get injured

1:36

because of those mistakes.

1:38

It doesn't mean you're a bad person, a horrible person,

1:41

a horrible, uh, position.

1:42

It just means a mistake was made. The process is in place.

1:45

And you have to ask yourself, look, is this a case

1:48

that just should resolve?

1:50

And is this a case where I'm gonna say,

1:52

yeah, I made a mistake?

1:53

And that's up to you and talk to your lawyer about it.

1:56

Um, but I want, I want you to be aware that you have a lot

1:59

of power in that regard, irrespective of

2:01

what your policy might say to direct the course

2:04

of the litigation process.

2:06

If you believe you did nothing wrong

2:08

and you feel that this case should be defendant, then

2:11

by all means, d defend it mightily.

2:14

And, um, you know,

2:15

then the worst case scenario is it ends up,

2:17

uh, ends up at trial.

2:19

So that's, uh, the basic litigation process

2:23

and I wish you all well with that.

2:26

I just wanna make, uh, one comment, Kel.

2:29

Um, this was from an article

2:31

that was just published in Radiographics by Dr.

2:34

Ji and Chen entitled, navigating Malpractice Guide

2:39

for US Radiologists.

2:40

The numbers that they quote in this article are that

2:44

although claims are common, the majority resolve in favor

2:48

of radiologists.

2:50

63% are abandoned or dismissed.

2:53

28% result in settlement agreements

2:57

and only 5% proceed to trial.

3:00

You said 7%, 5%.

3:01

This is for radiologists of the percentage that go to trial.

3:05

89% favor the defendant radiologist.

3:10

So it points up that

3:12

although you may be named in a suit, it may be

3:14

that the case will be dismissed.

3:17

It may be that it'll never get to trial

3:19

because all parties agree that something occurred

3:24

that is worth settling and not be, you know, in part maybe

3:29

because of the expense of putting on the trial, um,

3:32

but also in part because it's justified.

3:34

And then those that go to trial, Kelly had 80% this in, in,

3:39

in favor of radiologists was 89%.

3:42

Any comments about those numbers? Cal?

3:44

Yeah, I think that those are important points

3:46

and what I would say specifically related to radiologists

3:50

as the following, um, that you have to under that we

3:54

as plaintiff's attorneys have very strict deadlines that,

3:57

you know, in which plaintiffs can bring

3:59

lawsuits and that kind of thing.

4:01

We may not always have the ability, as hard as we try,

4:04

we may not have the ability

4:06

before a suit has to be filed under the law

4:09

to have everything perfectly vetted

4:11

and understand everything.

4:12

So if we're looking at this

4:14

and there's a possibility that a radiologist misread a case,

4:17

then you know, unfortunately you're gonna get named in

4:20

that suit simply to preserve our right

4:23

to go forward if it needs to.

4:24

But I think a lot of cases against radiologists fall into

4:27

that category where Dave just talked about, which is,

4:30

you get named, we finally can get all the information,

4:34

you go away and we hone down on who really needs to, to,

4:38

to move forward in the lawsuit.

4:40

So that is something that unfortunately, just

4:42

because of timelines and deadlines, that does happen,

4:45

even though we try to have those questions answered.

4:48

The other thing that can happen, um,

4:50

and we talked about this a little bit earlier, is

4:53

that we can get in the middle of the case

4:55

and the long as, as long as the statute

4:57

of limitations hasn't expired, you know,

4:59

we may be in a situation where somebody says, well,

5:02

I relied on the radiologist report and it was wrong.

5:04

Well, then you're gonna be brought in.

5:06

So those are just different scenarios that can happen.

5:09

But, um, I think pretty quickly that gets sorted out.

5:13

If there's a mistake made on the film,

5:15

it's pretty evident usually.

5:17

And then you're either settled out, move on,

5:21

d, defend it, whatever happens.

5:22

But yeah, those numbers, I think are pretty,

5:25

pretty accurate.