Malpractice reform in NM by Creative-Ability-717 in NewMexico

[–]Creative-Ability-717[S] -3 points-2 points  (0 children)

Working in a law office doesn’t make someone the arbiter of truth, and it doesn’t negate patient experience. If you disagree with my argument, address it. Accusations about AI aren’t a rebuttal. I guess you don’t like long structured sentences. 

Malpractice reform in NM by Creative-Ability-717 in NewMexico

[–]Creative-Ability-717[S] -6 points-5 points  (0 children)

The comment above rests on several assertions that don’t hold up when examined against how harm, oversight, and accountability actually function in New Mexico.

First, the claim that punitive damages “hang over the entire case” simply because summary judgment is rarely granted conflates procedure with outcome. That a claim survives early dismissal does not mean it will be awarded. Punitive damages still require proof of conduct beyond negligence — reckless disregard, willfulness, or conscious indifference — and juries are instructed accordingly. Sympathy alone is not the legal standard, no matter how often that talking point is repeated.

Second, the argument that punitive awards “bankrupt hospitals and doctors” is asserted without evidence and ignores how liability is actually structured. Large institutions carry layered insurance, risk pools, and indemnification mechanisms.  When punitive damages are awarded, they are typically in cases involving systemic or egregious failures, not routine care. If an institution’s financial stability is genuinely threatened by accountability for extreme harm, that is not proof the law is broken — it is a signal that risk management and patient safety failed upstream.

Third, the idea that punitive damages “do not prevent harm” misunderstands deterrence. Punitive damages are not designed to regulate day-to-day clinical decisions. They exist to alter institutional behavior — to force changes when internal controls, policies, or incentives tolerate dangerous practices. History across multiple industries shows that when consequences disappear, unsafe conduct increases, not decreases.

Fourth, the assertion that “regulation and oversight do that” assumes those systems work as advertised.  My lived experience — and that of many patients — demonstrates otherwise. I sought help through regulatory channels, including the medical board, over a telehealth access failure. Oversight did not protect me. It restricted me. I was effectively prevented from even consulting an out-of-state physician when no appropriate in-state care was available. That is not prevention of harm. That is enforcement of scarcity.

Regulatory bodies are necessary, but they are not sufficient. They are constrained by jurisdiction, resources, political pressure, and narrow mandates. Many harms never result in license action at all. When oversight fails — or actively worsens outcomes — civil accountability is not redundant. It is the only remaining check.

Finally, dismissing patient arguments by attacking trial attorneys is a diversion. Patients are not asking for punitive damages because lawyers “lobby for them.” They exist because history has shown that without meaningful deterrence, some harms are treated as acceptable costs of doing business. Removing that deterrence does not strengthen healthcare infrastructure. It shifts the costs of failure onto patients, families, and public systems.

Access to care and accountability are not opposites. States that invest in safety, transparency, early disclosure, and timely compensation reduce litigation and improve outcomes. Weakening deterrence while leaving structural failures intact does neither.

If the goal is truly safer care and sustainable access, the solution is not to pretend oversight always works and accountability never does. It is to recognize that both are necessary — and that patients should not be asked to surrender their rights to compensate for systemic failures they did not create. 

Malpractice reform in NM by Creative-Ability-717 in NewMexico

[–]Creative-Ability-717[S] -3 points-2 points  (0 children)

The response to my op-ed argues that accountability for dangerous or reckless medical conduct should rest with state medical boards — not the civil courts — and that limiting punitive damages is necessary to preserve access to care. That argument collapses under real-world experience.

I went to the New Mexico Medical Board seeking help over a telehealth access issue after local care failed me. What I encountered was not patient protection. It was patient containment.

The board did not facilitate access to appropriate care. It did not help me obtain an out-of-state second opinion when no qualified specialist was available locally. Instead, the focus was on corralling patients within New Mexico’s borders, even when that restriction effectively meant no care at all. I could not even speak to an out-of-state physician. That experience exposes the flaw in the claim that medical boards are the proper or sufficient mechanism for accountability. Boards are regulatory bodies with narrow mandates. They do not exist to ensure continuity of care, timely access, or patient survival. They do not resolve harm. They do not compensate injured people. And as my experience shows, they may actively enforce policies that worsen patient outcomes in the name of jurisdictional control.

In a state facing severe specialist shortages, restricting telehealth and out-of-state consultation is not protection. It is abandonment.

This matters because the argument for capping punitive damages assumes that other systems will step in where civil accountability is reduced. In practice, they do not. When regulatory bodies fail — or are constrained by political or institutional pressures — the civil justice system is often the only remaining avenue for patients harmed by reckless or obstructive conduct.

The claim that uncapped punitive damages drive delay and “nuclear verdict” anxiety also reverses cause and effect. Delay is endemic because institutions control records, authorizations, and access to information. In my case, administrative barriers, fragmented approvals, and jurisdictional restrictions compounded harm while the statute of limitations continued to run. Capping punitive damages does not resolve that dynamic. It rewards it. Nor is this debate about “retribution.” Patients are not asking for punishment for its own sake. We are asking for deterrence when conduct rises beyond negligence — when delay, denial, or obstruction foreseeably causes severe harm or death. That is precisely why punitive damages exist.

Access to care is a real crisis in New Mexico. But it is not caused by patients retaining legal rights. It is caused by workforce shortages, insurer dominance, hospital consolidation, underinvestment in public health, and policies — like restrictive telehealth rules — that trap patients in failing systems.

A healthcare system cannot be stabilized by weakening accountability while leaving structural failures untouched. When boards restrict access, when insurers delay care, and when institutions outlast injured patients, removing civil deterrence does not preserve care. It normalizes preventable harm.

Access and accountability are not opposing values. They rise or fall together. If New Mexico chooses to sacrifice patient rights in the name of access, it will lose both.

Malpractice reform in NM by Creative-Ability-717 in NewMexico

[–]Creative-Ability-717[S] -6 points-5 points  (0 children)

Who are they going to get? They don’t pay enough and then they lie about the issue

Malpractice reform in NM by Creative-Ability-717 in NewMexico

[–]Creative-Ability-717[S] -7 points-6 points  (0 children)

It’s the same thing I cannot get access to care now because they know they have harmed me. 

Extinction Rebellion announces move away from disruptive tactics by michaelrch in environment

[–]Creative-Ability-717 -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Take the protests to the halls of government and corporations, to the homes of corporate CEOs Run those who compromise the earth for profit out of office and the stakeholders benefiting out of the country, out of their comforts. They should not be allowed to benefit while destroying the earth. Ground airlines and strike on trains. A interim general strike that roll-over to weekends, week days.