One very common misconception is that medical malpractice lawsuits are at the core of our rising medical costs in the U.S. and that many of them are fraudulent. Well a study published in the May 11th issue of the New England Journal of Medicine begs to differ.

What the reviewers found was that 97 percent of the patients who sued for medical malpractice had indeed suffered harm. The study also found that most people who did not suffer injury did not receive compensation so that the system does seem to work there.  The problems came up with the time it took to complete the litigation process which was as long as 6 years. Streamlining the process is where much of the true savings would be although the costs pale in comparison to the drug cost increases over the past 20 years.