Gah!

[altivo]

Well, newsletter done and shipped off at least.

Thought Gary was over the after-effects of his root canal but yesterday and today he has been in growing pain, with swelling in a different spot in his mouth. He had been taking ibuprofen which has apparently raised his blood pressure too so he had to switch back to aspirin. Finally tonight he called the specialist's emergency number and they said they would phone in a prescription for an antibiotic and he should call in the morning for an emergency appointment. I'm not impressed with those folks. I think this is an infection caused by poor aseptic procedures on their part.

Off to drive him to the all night pharmacy for his medicine.

Health care in the US: more dubious than you think, and very expensive.

Comments

[avon_deer]

That sounds bad. Can you take action against the dentist if it's proven to be his doing?

[altivo]

Not really. The legal expenses would cancel out any actual award, so not worth the stress and trouble. It's becoming clear though that this guy is more concerned with cranking patients through and taking the money than he is with actual patient care.

When you hear of huge medical malpractice awards in the US, and there are many of those, remember that the lawyers get the money. My older brother won a multi-million dollar lawsuit against a dentist for the serious error that resulted in my sister-in-law's death. The lawyers took over three million dollars of it. All he got was her actual medical care costs for the two years it took her to die. Lawyer==Vampire.

[davv]

The lack of loser-pays doesn't help either.

[altivo]

Loser-pays does discourage frivolous lawsuits. But given a court system that is heavily stacked in favor of corporations and wealthy clients, it would also discourage me from filing.

There are, of course, lawyers who will take a case on "no fee unless I win" terms, but they also do usually insist on taking the lion's share of any settlement. Class action lawsuits in the US, which usually operate on loser-pays, invariably make millions for the lawyers and get next to nothing for the plaintiffs. (Lawyers get $100 million, individual plaintiffs get a coupon for $20 off if they buy another similar gadget from the same guilty manufacturer, for instance.)

[davv]

Loser-pays does discourage frivolous lawsuits. But given a court system that is heavily stacked in favor of corporations and wealthy clients, it would also discourage me from filing.

I had the impression that American-style payments (both parties pay) would always favor the corporations, all other things equal, because the corporations have deeper pockets than ordinary people. That is, they benefit by only paying part of the costs for the cases they lose, and they also benefit by being able to scare people from going to court even when said people have a real case.

We don't really have class action suits here that I know of, so I only know them by reference: reading in a news article that some company lost and now have to give all the members of the class a coupon or a discount. (It tends to strike me as silly, too: punish a company by giving them more sales? It's only going to work if they were close enough to the margin that each discounted sale is a loss, and even then, far from everyone's going to make use of the opportunity.)

[altivo]

That type of settlement (coupons and such) is not usually determined after an actual trial. It's an out of court agreement between the attorneys and the defendants, both of whom get what they want and to hell with the injured parties.

[chibiabos.livejournal.com]

Huh ... I didn't know for certain that Ibuprofen raises blood pressure, but Ibuprofen was how I was diagnosed with migraine back in 2000. I had a persistent headache for about 6 months before getting to an "indigent care" doctor. He first prescribed prescription-dose Ibuprofen, which actually made my headache worse, at which point he determined it was migraine. Thinking on it, that does make sense that would happen if Ibuprofen raises blood pressure. I've had to cut back on salt to reduce my migraine, as that too raises blood pressure.

[altivo]

Yes, it's a known side effect of ibuprofen, particularly prolonged use. Some people are affected more than others, as with so many things.