Capping damages

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The availability of health care in rural areas already is inadequate, but it could get much worse if state or federal lawmakers don't cap juries' malpractice awards. Exorbitant jury awards are driving up the cost of doctors' liability insurance. That, in turn, is driving some doctors out of business.

Evidence suggests that doctors in rural areas especially are hurt by high insurance premiums. Those physicians tend to make significantly less money than their urban counterparts, but both have to pay insurance premiums that may be as high as $50,000 a year.

As a result, some doctors are leaving rural areas or discontinuing important services such as obstetrics, brain surgery or other high-risk specialties that more often attract lawsuits.

Both federal and state lawmakers are considering a cap of $250,000 on "pain and suffering" — so called noneconomic damages. That limit would not apply to economic damages such as lost wages, medical bills or funeral expenses.

If federal or state lawmakers do not approve a cap on economic damages, some South Carolina doctors might be tempted to move their practices to one of the 23 states that do cap noneconomic damages. Tort reform is needed to make doctors — and especially rural doctors — stay put in South Carolina.