Poor communication between the physician and the patient is a root cause leading to filing a medical liability lawsuit. Recently, Thomas Fleeter, MD, and Robert Slater, MD, of the AAOS Medical Liability Committee, spoke with Lee McMullin, CPHRM, about how to talk to patients after an adverse event. Mr. McMullin is senior risk management and patient safety specialist for Cooperative of American Physicians, a physician-owned and governed, California-based medical malpractice liability cooperative that provides medical professional liability protection and risk management services.

The California Court of Appeal has upheld a hospital board’s decision to deny staff privileges to a physician with a history of sexual harassment even though the facility’s judicial review committee had found in favor of the physician joining the staff.

A physician involved in a lengthy surgery was properly suspended from the hospital staff, the Court of Appeal has ruled, dismissing the physician’s challenge to the hospital’s peer review process.

Though it does not end a 10-year privileges dispute, a new California Supreme Court decision sheds light on when violations of hospital bylaws are material –or merely inconsequential.

There may be no other single hospital event that causes more debate among the courts than patients falling off of beds and gurneys. Rails up or rails down.