Philadelphia Top Injury Lawyer Blog

My goal as a Pennsylvania medical malpractice lawyer is to help my clients get the compensation they need to treat their injuries and adapt to life after a serious medical error. So I was interested to see a recent Pennsylvania Supreme Court decision in a case about who was responsible for paying a victim of medical malpractice. In Heim v. Medical Care Availability and Reduction of Error Fund, the underlying medical malpractice case was filed by Stephen Heim, whose wife died as a result of an alleged medical error by two doctors in a family practice. Heim won a judgment against them in 2000, but their malpractice insurance had gone bankrupt, and the insurer that inherited the policy did not pay enough to cover the entire amount. A state fund, called the CAT fund, existed to make up the shortfall, but it denied any responsibility to pay. Heim sued the doctors to recover from their personal assets.

One of the doctors, and his medical group, filed their own lawsuit against the CAT fund, seeking a declaratory judgment that it had to pay the shortfall. The doctor then settled with Heim by assigning his claim against the CAT fund to Heim. Thus, Heim became the plaintiff in that matter. The trial court found that the CAT fund was liable. The fund then filed this appeal, arguing that it was not liable for shortfalls that come from the bankruptcy of a primary insurer. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court disagreed. Using the plain language of the statute, as it applied at the time, the court found that the CAT fund is responsible for covering judgments in excess of the insured's own primary coverage. Because joint and several liability applied in the case, that responsibility to cover extends to any liability the insured assumes on behalf of another party -- in this case, the second doctor. Thus, the CAT fund is obligated to pay the shortfall.

As a Pennsylvania medical negligence lawyer, I'm always pleased to see injured people get the financial recovery they're entitled to. In this case, Heim originally filed his case in 1998, which means he has waited more than a decade for a resolution to his case. While long delays are not unusual in medical malpractice cases, it's a shame that squabbling over who was obligated to pay what held up his compensation. In a case with a seriously injured plaintiff who needs the money for medical care, adaptation to a disability or to make ends meet, this kind of delay is a serious hardship. As a Philadelphia birth injury lawyer, I work hard to ensure that my clients have their needs taken care of -- though never at the expense of a fair settlement.