OHSU was among several state organizations that enjoyed protection against hefty lawsuit damages, but that ended in December 2007 when the Oregon Supreme Court removed the $200,000 cap on damages. As a result, OHSU finally settled six ongoing cases—cases that were filed in 2001 or earlier—agreeing to pay damages totaling $38.5 million. The settled cases included an award of $9.3 million for the family of Jordaan Clarke, who suffered permanent brain damage as a result of a botched operation in 1998, as well as an $11.8 million award to Christian Wright and a $8.3 million award for Adam Cristopherson, both of whom sustained permanent damage from surgeries.

Twenty-four states now have caps on the amount of noneconomic damages a plaintiff can get in medical malpractice cases. Why? Many feel such cases are often frivolous, that plaintiffs ask for more money than is reasonable, and that greedy lawyers are to blame for escalating damages. According to an article by David A. Hyman in Forbes Magazine, however, these caps are hurting more than helping–they are hurting those who truly cannot afford the economic consequences of negligently caused injuries.

Many of us have heard stories about botched surgeries during which medical instruments are left inside patients, but how many of us considered these stories to be urban legends? Sadly, such stories aren’t tall tales but often the truth. A recent story in the Salt Lake Tribune documented serious medical errors that took place in Utah hospitals in the twenty-first century. These “never events,” or sentinel events, as they are called, numbered some 219 from October 2001 to April 2007 and resulted in the deaths of nearly half. Among these errors were patients receiving the wrong blood type during transfusions, patients receiving the wrong type of medication, patients having the wrong type of surgery performed, and patients, specifically infants, being dropped.

Who could imagine that dental care could be hazardous enough to cause death? Though uncommon, apparently there have been enough patient deaths resulting from dental care to prompt the state of Washington’s Health Secretary to ask the state’s dental board, known as the Washington Dental Quality Assurance Commission, to launch an investigation.

The Seattle P-I newspaper first published a story on July 15, 2008, that investigated three patient deaths. The article asserted that the dental board’s investigations of these deaths were inadequate.