Question: Which of the following choices is best?
A. Controversy exists over whether defensive medicine is widely practiced and whether it raises health care costs.
B. Everyone agrees that defensive medicine is widely practiced.
C. Doctors who spend more for their hospitalized patients have been reported to face a lower malpractice risk.
D. A and C.
E. B and C.
Answer: D. Virtually all doctors admit they practice defensive medicine, which describes medical care specifically directed to attenuate the threat of malpractice liability rather than for a proper medical indication. Survey studies generally put the prevalence at greater than 90%, but what separates true defensive medicine from careful practice or patient expectation/demand remains controversial.
Dr. S.Y. Tan
A mail survey of 824 physicians in high-risk specialties in Pennsylvania, a state where doctors pay high malpractice premiums, revealed that nearly all reported practicing defensive medicine. The respondents admitted to both assurance behavior – such as ordering more tests, especially imaging studies – as well as avoidance behavior – that is, restricting or eliminating complex procedures or perceived litigious patients.1
In another study, emergency physicians in the upper third of “malpractice fear” used more diagnostic tests and were more likely to hospitalize patients at low risk for coronary artery disease.2
On the other hand, a report using simulated clinical scenarios concluded that the extent of defensive medicine was at most 8%, and another found no correlation between individual malpractice claims experience and resource use, physician concern about malpractice, tolerance for uncertainty, or perception of risk.3
Another area of contention is whether some of our soaring health care costs may reflect defensive medicine at play.
A recent survey of 2,000 U.S. orthopedic surgeons found that 96% admitted practicing defensive medicine, with 24% of all ordered tests being for defensive reasons. The authors estimated that this amounted to about $100,000 per surgeon per year, or a total annual sum of $2 billion for the 20,400 orthopedic surgeons in the U.S.4
By correlating professional liability insurance with cost of services, the AMA estimated that in the 1980s, defensive medicine cost $12.1 billion to $13.7 billion each year.5 In an oft-cited study by Kessler and McClellan, the authors measured the effects of malpractice liability reforms using data from elderly Medicare beneficiaries treated for serious heart disease.6 They found that reforms that directly reduced provider liability pressure led to reductions of 5%-9% in medical expenditures. If such Medicare savings, which amounted to $600 million per year for cardiac disease, were extrapolated across the health care system, the annual savings would total $50 billion.
A more conservative study estimated that systemwide savings from aggressive malpractice reform would approach $41 billion over 5 years.7
Dr. Anupam B. Jena and his coauthors are the latest investigators seeking to clarify the correlation between defensive medicine and health care costs.8 Using Florida hospital admission data from 2000-2009, which covered some 24,000 physicians in seven separate specialties, the authors found that higher spending by physicians was associated with reduced malpractice claims the following year. This pattern held true for six of the seven specialties, family practitioners being the sole exception.
For example, among internists, the malpractice risk probability was reduced from 1.5% in the bottom spending fifth ($19,725 per admission) to 0.3% in the top fifth ($39,379 per admission). Among obstetricians, a separate subgroup analysis of cesarean-section rates revealed that malpractice claims were approximately halved among obstetricians with rates in the highest fifth, compared with the lowest fifth. These results comport with previous reports of higher C-section rates in obstetricians who perceived themselves at higher malpractice risk, although other studies have found no correlation or an actual lower rate.
In concluding that higher resource use by physicians was associated with fewer malpractice claims, the authors acknowledged that a principal limitation of the study was the lack of information on illness severity. Importantly, they were unable to state whether higher spending was defensively motivated. A companion editorial questioned whether increased resource expenditure was a bona fide reflection of defensive medicine or may simply have resulted in fewer errors and adverse events.9
Unfortunately, the past malpractice experience of the doctors, which could provide insight into more defensive postures, better communication, etc., was not measured in the study. In addition, claims made just 1 year after an incident may not accurately reflect the real-world situation, where the filing of a lawsuit may lag any alleged negligence by a much longer period, especially in obstetric cases.
Worryingly, the results of this timely study may be used to imply that the more doctors spend, the less likely they are to be sued – a troubling notion in our current race to stem rising health care costs.