ONE-MAN MEDICAL MALPRACTICE MACHINE EXHIBITS LITIGIOUS TENDENCIES

I love this story, which comes to us from West Virginia, courtesy of the Charleston Gazette . A local surgeon who managed to generate 124 medical malpractice lawsuits against himself in less than two years is apparently lawsuit-happy in a most unproductive way.  He has sued the lawyers who defended him during hospital-initiated proceedings to terminate his privileges, among other things, and has sued just about everyone else who ever looked askance at the “quality” of his surgeries.  Putnam General Hospital, at which Dr. John A. King racked up his impressive statistics, settled the suits involving King for approximately $100 million last year.

King also sued the Hospital Corporation of America, the parent company of his former workplace, Putnam General Hospital, which had restricted King’s priviliges following an independent investigation that concluded King was a “snake-oil salesman” and “criminal.”

For once, I have to agree with all the proponents of “tort reform.”  Frivolous lawsuits really are a problem.  But especially when they are instigated by an incompetent physician.