Are today’s medical students be trained to practice, in part, defensive medicine? If numbers from a recent Harvard study are any indication, perhaps it should be a required discipline.

A comprehensive analysis by researchers at Harvard University figures the annual overall cost of medical liability to be $55.6 billion, or 2.4 percent of total health care spending, according to an article published in the September issue of the journal Health Affairs.

Any serious look at reforming this sector of health reform is possible only when data such as this is publicized. It certainly provides a good starting point in addressing an issue that continues to be responsible for an ever-increasing amount of healthcare expenditure year after year. Methods and models of reimbursement (FFS vs. other models) affected by defensive medical practice could be ripe for reform, for example. | LINK

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