Personal Injury Law

Trying Medical Malpractice Cases in Nashville

By John Day

A recent study gives yet another reason of why it is difficult for a plaintiff to win a medical malpractice case in Nashville.

MTSU's Business and Economic Research Center has released a study that states that puts health care industry's annual economic impact in Nashville at $30 billion. That represents  an increase of 60 percent since 2004.  The number of jobs in teh Nashville MSA directly tied to the health care industry has grown from 94,000 to more than 110,000.

The study reports that "[m]ore than 56 major health care companies (public and private) have chosen Nashville as their home, and seven of the nation's 12 leading for-profit acute care hospital companies are located in Nashville, controlling more than one-third of the investor-owned hospitals in the United States."

Believe it or not,  in the Nashville MSA 1 out of 12 occupations was a health care occupation in 2008. paying total wages of $4.7 billion.

Here is the Executive Summary of the report.  The entire report may be read here.

The challenge for the plaintiff's lawyer is to help those health care-related jurors understand that a verdict for a plaintiff in a medical malpractice case is not a verdict against the industry that feeds their family.   Jurors must be persuaded  that every person - doctor, nurse, truck driver or lawyer - is responsible for harm caused by his or her  negligence, and that a verdict for a patient is not an indictment of the entire health care delivery system.

Full post as published by Day on Torts on July 20, 2010 (boomark / email).