Repeal Feres doctrine.

[jwinch2]

http://www.airforcetimes.com/news/2009/05/military_feres_doctrine_hinchey_051909w/

Its about time. Lets hope that this moves forward.

[11Bravo]

I'm hoping it goes about a foot and dies.
One thing to not inform someone about a medical condition, but from what I've seen, this'll open up lawsuits from all over.
I'm seeing class action suits for war injuries, training accidents, and everything else.

[jwinch2]

As it stands now, our service members can be victims of gross medical negligence with no legal recourse. I have a serious problem with that. There is probably a way to word things to give service members their due right of recourse and still prevent frivolous lawsuits.

[CryingWolf]

Well this would fall under a malpractice suit if he was seen by a doctor at a VA hospital. Not sure about suing a VA doctor but I know any other doctor could be sued under malpractice.

This guy was 29 years old and a simple biopsy could have saved his life. What the hell was the doctor thinking? My doctor biopsied a spot on my foot just to be sure. Personally I think it was just a spot of dirt under the skin but he said we take no chances.

I think the line could be an easy one. Doctors whether apart of the military or not still must be licensed by a medical board and held accountable for their actions.

Now with all that said, I do believe that is one of the problems with health care in the US; too many frivolous law suits against doctors.

Do I think a family should be able to sue the doctor for not saving private smith from a battle field chest wound when the doctor used all means to try to save private smith's life. No more then my wife should be able to sue the doctor for not being able to save my life.

This is a lot different then suing the military over training accidents, war wounds etc.

[11Bravo]

I as said, not informing someone of a medical condition is one thing.
As I understand it, this would allow people to sue the military/government for anything.
Lawyers would gladly line up to sue for all kinds of things.
I do not buy into the notion that everyone in the military is a hero.
Not even close; there are thousands of worthless POS white-trash or whatever other group you want to single out.
And just about everyone of them would happily sue for something as a way to live life free off of the taxpayers dime.
This would just give them another option.

[jwinch2]

This would remove an exemption which allows gross negligence and medical malpractice to stand uncontested. It does not add excuses for frivolous lawsuits.

Feres is one of the reasons that in the past the government felt free to experiment on soldiers without their knowledge, force soldiers to take vaccines that were experimental which had risks about which the soldiers were uninformed, and give absolutely horrendous medical care while providing no recourse for the soldier who received that care.

I know not everyone uniform is a hero. I noticed the same amount of wastes of space when I was in the Army as well. It has nothing whatsoever to do with this conversation. Yeah, they suck at their job. So what? That doesn't mean that they don't deserve the same protections in regard to their medical practice that they would get as a civilian. Or does it? Do they deserve to die when they could have lived had they received proper care? I would imagine if it was you who had been screwed over or someone you cared about, you would be singing a different tune. Hero or not.

[Erk1015]

I think their hearts are in the right place, but their heads are lodged somewhere unclean. If this passes then everytime a military doctor screws up the DOD will get a multi-million dollar bill. We had a doc in Iraq that had to choose between two guys, one lived and the other didn't. With this plan the guy's family could sue for wrongful death and double the national deficit. I'd say it's lawyers looking for another way into uncle sammy's back pocket.

[CryingWolf]

If this passes then everytime a military doctor screws up the DOD will get a multi-million dollar bill.

What makes a military doctor any more special then a civilian doctor? This is why doctors carry malpractice insurance. Personally I would want a military doctor who places the Hippocratic Oath above any military oath. He or she was probably a doctor before going into the military and will probably be a doctor when they leave the military. If the doctor did the right thing to the best of his or her abilities then I really don't see multimillion dollar bills going anywhere.

I guess what this really means is military doctors are not real doctors? :eek:

[Erk1015]

What makes a military doctor any more special then a civilian doctor? This is why doctors carry malpractice insurance. Personally I would want a military doctor who places the Hippocratic Oath above any military oath. He or she was probably a doctor before going into the military and will probably be a doctor when they leave the military. If the doctor did the right thing to the best of his or her abilities then I really don't see multimillion dollar bills going anywhere.

I guess what this really means is military doctors are not real doctors? :eek:

I wouldn't say that anything makes them more special, but they are definitely in a different position from most doctors in that they have two responsibilities, one to the mission and another to the patient. This Dr. put it very well I think, he goes by Dr Jack Smith on this page:

http://www.health.mil/Debates/Debate.aspx?ID=11

The reasoning behind the Feres doctrine has nothing to do with the medical doctor or any other individual servicemember, it is about protecting the government from lawsuits. This is from wikipedia, it's a dumbed down version of the full decision, but it illustrates the point well enough:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feres_v._United_States

I think it would probably be a good idea for military doctors to carry malpractice insurance, but first they need to come up with a system for how that would work since the military is so different from civilian medicine.

[Cardiac Nurse]

The military world of medicine is completely different than the civilian world of medicine. I have worked on the civilian side for 14 years as a nurse. I experienced the military side for a few years as a military spouse (dependent being the best definition of that since I did not exist outside of my husband according to the military).

As a stage IIIa melanoma survivor I know that detection and prevention is worth a pound of cure. This soldier should have been made aware he had been diagnosed with Melanoma.

That said, the civilian side of medicine is all about avoiding law suits. Yes in the military the rules are different. I would hope though that the military would find a way to discipline its own medical community and hold it accountable without the crazy lawsuits seen on the civilian side.

Many of the physicians I now work with became physicians on the military's bill... many pay crazy amounts of money for malpractice insurance and some have even limited what they will do in their practices because of the potential for lawsuits.