Some doctors practice “defensive medicine,” ordering extra tests and procedures believing this will ward off malpractice suits. A new study suggests that it does.
Using data on 24,637 physicians and more than 18 million hospital admissions in Florida between 2000 and 2009, researchers found that the more a hospital billed, the less likely the doctor was to be sued.
For example, among the one-fifth of general surgeons who billed the least, the rate of malpractice claims was 2.3 percent, while among the one-fifth who billed the most, the rate was 0.4 percent.
