marika
April 27th 08, 05:31 PM
in another news article I read that Cohen was going to discontinue the Borat
character
I wonder if they maybe went to arbitration and that was part of the
settlement?
"marika" > wrote in message news:...
> Some of the Roanokers in the Sasha Baron Cohen Borat movie sued Cohen for
> embarrassing them
>
> I wonder how their lawsuit is going
>
>
> I don't know.... I don't think the drunk dullards had much to sue for....
> they act like that 24/7 anyway (with or without a camera filming them),
> and
> presumably they are not "ashamed" of their own daily personas, so why sue
> that the rest of the world gets to see it on screen now? if you are
> embarassed of yourself, change yourself... don't blame other people who
> catch you just being your regular self on film!
>
----- Original Message -----
From: "marika" >
Newsgroups: alt.recovery.na.hardcore-action,alt.usenet.legends.lester-mosley
Sent: Sunday, March 30, 2008 9:59 PM
Subject: choice son
> it's not really a choice then is it?
>
>
>
> Arbitration a growing trend in health care
> Doctors say it will hold down medical costs, but patients say they fear
> giving up the right to sue.
>
> By Stacey Burling
>
> Inquirer Staff Writer
> Within the space of two weeks late last year, Michael and Hedy Cohen,
> who happen to be experts on medical errors, each encountered what they
> saw as a disturbing development in the modern doctor-patient relationship.
>
> They were asked by two groups of suburban doctors to sign away their
> right to a jury trial in the interest of reducing malpractice costs.
>
> Legal experts say such attempts to channel potentially unhappy patients
> away from the court system and into arbitration are becoming
> increasingly common in health care. Agreements to settle future disputes
> with binding arbitration, in which an appointed individual or small
> panel decides the case instead of a judge or jury, are now pervasive in
> contracts involving many other things we buy, including credit cards,
> cell phones and cars.
>
> Proponents say arbitration is faster, cheaper and fairer than trials,
> but critics say the secretive system can be weighted against consumers
> and makes it harder to track complaints or build legal precedents.
>
> Eugene Rosov, who runs two malpractice-insurance companies that advise
> doctors to use arbitration agreements, said he thought they ultimately
> would reduce the cost of insurance and defensive medicine - tests
> ordered primarily to protect against lawsuits. "This agreement is better
> for doctors and for patients," said Rosov, whose companies have 35
> subscribers in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. "The only person it's bad
> for is the plaintiffs attorneys."
>
> But Temple University law professor Bill Woodward thinks the growth of a
> private judicial system "is a pretty nasty legal development, I think,
> and it's just crying out for correction from Congress."
>
> A bill introduced last year by Sen. Russ Feingold (D., Wis.) aims to do
> that. It would prohibit pre-dispute arbitration clauses involving
> employment, consumer, franchise and civil rights disputes.
>
> Michael Cohen was handed an arbitration agreement when he visited his
> longtime primary-care doctor in Bucks County. Cohen said he was not the
> suing kind, but the thought of being asked to give up his right to sue
> "stopped me in my tracks."
>
> He said no, and his doctor saw him anyway.
>
> Then Hedy Cohen, who has had a kidney transplant, was mailed a similar
> form by a group of kidney specialists she planned to see for the first
> time. The form from Hypertension-Nephrology Associates in Willow Grove
> insisted on binding arbitration and said she would have to pay the
> doctors' legal fees if she filed a complaint and lost.
>
> Hedy Cohen said no and was told to find another nephrologist.
>
> That was fine with Cohen, a nurse with a master's degree in health-care
> administration. "I couldn't have a relationship with this person because
> they had already set the tone," she said. "We're adversaries before
> we
> even know each other."
>
> Jerry Dolchin, the nephrologists' attorney, said the doctors began using
> the forms at the height of Pennsylvania's malpractice crisis in 2003,
> when doctors, he said, were being "hit pretty hard by overzealous
> plaintiffs' lawyers." Since then, he said, "hundreds and hundreds
> and
> hundreds" of patients have signed the form.
>
> Ruth Schulze, a North Jersey gynecologist, started asking patients to
> sign an arbitration agreement last year after she bought malpractice
> protection from Obstetricians & Gynecologists Risk Retention Group of
> America Inc., one of Rosov's companies. She gave up obstetrics two years
> ago after she was told she would have to pay more than $120,000 for
> insurance.
>
> Schulze said she won each of the three times she was sued, but left the
> trials disenchanted. "It is not really a trial of your peers," she said.
> "It's theater."
>
> Her patients have largely embraced the new approach, she said. She will
> not do surgery on anyone who refuses to sign the form, which limits pain
> and suffering payments.
>
> For her, the arbitration agreement sets the groundwork for a more
> trusting doctor-patient relationship. Patients need to understand that
> bad things happen in spite of doctors' best efforts. "Medicine is not
> guaranteed perfection," she said.
>
> Steven Barrer, a Montgomery County neurosurgeon, says he thinks he was
> the first in his area to start using an arbitration agreement around
> 2003. Barrer wanted to "somehow create malpractice reform for myself
> since it wasn't coming from the courts and it wasn't coming from the
> legislature."
>
> He got the idea for an arbitration agreement from his cell phone
> contract. "I figured if they can do it, why can't I?" he said.
>
> Out of thousands of new patients, only about 10 have refused to sign the
> form. He does not ask patients with emergencies.
>
> No one knows how many doctors here use such agreements, but the practice
> does not appear widespread. It is common on the West Coast, and legal
> experts say it is spreading nationally. Many nursing homes ask residents
> to sign arbitration agreements, experts said. Golden Living, a national
> chain that operates 40 nursing homes in Pennsylvania, says about half of
> its residents agree to arbitration.
>
> Doctors who join Medical Justice, another group trying to reduce
> malpractice expenses, do not require patients to agree to arbitration,
> but do ask them to sign contracts saying they will not file "frivolous"
> lawsuits and will use only board-certified specialists as medical
> experts in court.
>
> In a project set to start next month in Montgomery County, the local
> medical society, bar association, and Abington Memorial are working
> together to solve medical disputes with mediation. While an arbitrator
> decides a case, a mediator shuttles between the two sides to help them
> reach an agreement. If they fail, the patient can still file a lawsuit.
>
> The Rothman Institute, one of the largest and best-known surgical
> practices in the region, is currently mulling whether to ask patients to
> sign statements saying they will try arbitration or mediation.
>
> Trial lawyers say mediation raises far fewer ethical concerns than
> binding arbitration, but critics of mediation say it often fails,
> becoming just another step to a lawsuit.
>
> Legal experts say courts have been mixed on upholding the agreements.
> Barrer said two patients had tested his contract. It was upheld in one
> case and shot down in the other. Lawyers said requirements hidden in
> fine print, particularly arbitration systems that require consumers to
> travel long distances, are legally shaky.
>
> John O'Donnell, senior counsel for Temple Health System, said Temple
> considered asking patients to sign agreements but feared most would not
> read them and worried that those who did would be upset. They also
> thought the agreements were likely to be unenforceable. The system
> decided instead to work harder to avoid mistakes and do a better job of
> dealing with mistakes that still occurred.
>
> John O'Brien, a health-care defense lawyer, said he thought the
> agreements should give patients time to think and should clearly say
> that patients were giving up their constitutional right to a jury trial.
>
> Critics of arbitration say it tends to benefit companies that frequently
> need arbitrators. It makes sense, they argue, that arbitrators would be
> more interested in pleasing "repeat users" than a consumer involved in
> one dispute.
>
> "There are certainly companies that have their favorite arbitrators . .
> . and they use them and use them and use them," said William Callaham, a
> Sacramento lawyer who is president of the American Board of Trial
> Advocates, a group seeking to protect jury trials. "Let's face it. They
> use them because they get the results they want."
>
> Doctors have far fewer disputes than cell phone companies, but Alan
> Schwartz, a plaintiffs' lawyer, still thinks malpractice victims do
> better in court. The arbitration system rules, he said, work against him.
>
> "I have to play my game in their stadium with their refs."
>
>
> http://www.philly.com/inquirer/business/homepage/20080210_Arbitration_a_growing_trend_in_health_car e.html
>
character
I wonder if they maybe went to arbitration and that was part of the
settlement?
"marika" > wrote in message news:...
> Some of the Roanokers in the Sasha Baron Cohen Borat movie sued Cohen for
> embarrassing them
>
> I wonder how their lawsuit is going
>
>
> I don't know.... I don't think the drunk dullards had much to sue for....
> they act like that 24/7 anyway (with or without a camera filming them),
> and
> presumably they are not "ashamed" of their own daily personas, so why sue
> that the rest of the world gets to see it on screen now? if you are
> embarassed of yourself, change yourself... don't blame other people who
> catch you just being your regular self on film!
>
----- Original Message -----
From: "marika" >
Newsgroups: alt.recovery.na.hardcore-action,alt.usenet.legends.lester-mosley
Sent: Sunday, March 30, 2008 9:59 PM
Subject: choice son
> it's not really a choice then is it?
>
>
>
> Arbitration a growing trend in health care
> Doctors say it will hold down medical costs, but patients say they fear
> giving up the right to sue.
>
> By Stacey Burling
>
> Inquirer Staff Writer
> Within the space of two weeks late last year, Michael and Hedy Cohen,
> who happen to be experts on medical errors, each encountered what they
> saw as a disturbing development in the modern doctor-patient relationship.
>
> They were asked by two groups of suburban doctors to sign away their
> right to a jury trial in the interest of reducing malpractice costs.
>
> Legal experts say such attempts to channel potentially unhappy patients
> away from the court system and into arbitration are becoming
> increasingly common in health care. Agreements to settle future disputes
> with binding arbitration, in which an appointed individual or small
> panel decides the case instead of a judge or jury, are now pervasive in
> contracts involving many other things we buy, including credit cards,
> cell phones and cars.
>
> Proponents say arbitration is faster, cheaper and fairer than trials,
> but critics say the secretive system can be weighted against consumers
> and makes it harder to track complaints or build legal precedents.
>
> Eugene Rosov, who runs two malpractice-insurance companies that advise
> doctors to use arbitration agreements, said he thought they ultimately
> would reduce the cost of insurance and defensive medicine - tests
> ordered primarily to protect against lawsuits. "This agreement is better
> for doctors and for patients," said Rosov, whose companies have 35
> subscribers in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. "The only person it's bad
> for is the plaintiffs attorneys."
>
> But Temple University law professor Bill Woodward thinks the growth of a
> private judicial system "is a pretty nasty legal development, I think,
> and it's just crying out for correction from Congress."
>
> A bill introduced last year by Sen. Russ Feingold (D., Wis.) aims to do
> that. It would prohibit pre-dispute arbitration clauses involving
> employment, consumer, franchise and civil rights disputes.
>
> Michael Cohen was handed an arbitration agreement when he visited his
> longtime primary-care doctor in Bucks County. Cohen said he was not the
> suing kind, but the thought of being asked to give up his right to sue
> "stopped me in my tracks."
>
> He said no, and his doctor saw him anyway.
>
> Then Hedy Cohen, who has had a kidney transplant, was mailed a similar
> form by a group of kidney specialists she planned to see for the first
> time. The form from Hypertension-Nephrology Associates in Willow Grove
> insisted on binding arbitration and said she would have to pay the
> doctors' legal fees if she filed a complaint and lost.
>
> Hedy Cohen said no and was told to find another nephrologist.
>
> That was fine with Cohen, a nurse with a master's degree in health-care
> administration. "I couldn't have a relationship with this person because
> they had already set the tone," she said. "We're adversaries before
> we
> even know each other."
>
> Jerry Dolchin, the nephrologists' attorney, said the doctors began using
> the forms at the height of Pennsylvania's malpractice crisis in 2003,
> when doctors, he said, were being "hit pretty hard by overzealous
> plaintiffs' lawyers." Since then, he said, "hundreds and hundreds
> and
> hundreds" of patients have signed the form.
>
> Ruth Schulze, a North Jersey gynecologist, started asking patients to
> sign an arbitration agreement last year after she bought malpractice
> protection from Obstetricians & Gynecologists Risk Retention Group of
> America Inc., one of Rosov's companies. She gave up obstetrics two years
> ago after she was told she would have to pay more than $120,000 for
> insurance.
>
> Schulze said she won each of the three times she was sued, but left the
> trials disenchanted. "It is not really a trial of your peers," she said.
> "It's theater."
>
> Her patients have largely embraced the new approach, she said. She will
> not do surgery on anyone who refuses to sign the form, which limits pain
> and suffering payments.
>
> For her, the arbitration agreement sets the groundwork for a more
> trusting doctor-patient relationship. Patients need to understand that
> bad things happen in spite of doctors' best efforts. "Medicine is not
> guaranteed perfection," she said.
>
> Steven Barrer, a Montgomery County neurosurgeon, says he thinks he was
> the first in his area to start using an arbitration agreement around
> 2003. Barrer wanted to "somehow create malpractice reform for myself
> since it wasn't coming from the courts and it wasn't coming from the
> legislature."
>
> He got the idea for an arbitration agreement from his cell phone
> contract. "I figured if they can do it, why can't I?" he said.
>
> Out of thousands of new patients, only about 10 have refused to sign the
> form. He does not ask patients with emergencies.
>
> No one knows how many doctors here use such agreements, but the practice
> does not appear widespread. It is common on the West Coast, and legal
> experts say it is spreading nationally. Many nursing homes ask residents
> to sign arbitration agreements, experts said. Golden Living, a national
> chain that operates 40 nursing homes in Pennsylvania, says about half of
> its residents agree to arbitration.
>
> Doctors who join Medical Justice, another group trying to reduce
> malpractice expenses, do not require patients to agree to arbitration,
> but do ask them to sign contracts saying they will not file "frivolous"
> lawsuits and will use only board-certified specialists as medical
> experts in court.
>
> In a project set to start next month in Montgomery County, the local
> medical society, bar association, and Abington Memorial are working
> together to solve medical disputes with mediation. While an arbitrator
> decides a case, a mediator shuttles between the two sides to help them
> reach an agreement. If they fail, the patient can still file a lawsuit.
>
> The Rothman Institute, one of the largest and best-known surgical
> practices in the region, is currently mulling whether to ask patients to
> sign statements saying they will try arbitration or mediation.
>
> Trial lawyers say mediation raises far fewer ethical concerns than
> binding arbitration, but critics of mediation say it often fails,
> becoming just another step to a lawsuit.
>
> Legal experts say courts have been mixed on upholding the agreements.
> Barrer said two patients had tested his contract. It was upheld in one
> case and shot down in the other. Lawyers said requirements hidden in
> fine print, particularly arbitration systems that require consumers to
> travel long distances, are legally shaky.
>
> John O'Donnell, senior counsel for Temple Health System, said Temple
> considered asking patients to sign agreements but feared most would not
> read them and worried that those who did would be upset. They also
> thought the agreements were likely to be unenforceable. The system
> decided instead to work harder to avoid mistakes and do a better job of
> dealing with mistakes that still occurred.
>
> John O'Brien, a health-care defense lawyer, said he thought the
> agreements should give patients time to think and should clearly say
> that patients were giving up their constitutional right to a jury trial.
>
> Critics of arbitration say it tends to benefit companies that frequently
> need arbitrators. It makes sense, they argue, that arbitrators would be
> more interested in pleasing "repeat users" than a consumer involved in
> one dispute.
>
> "There are certainly companies that have their favorite arbitrators . .
> . and they use them and use them and use them," said William Callaham, a
> Sacramento lawyer who is president of the American Board of Trial
> Advocates, a group seeking to protect jury trials. "Let's face it. They
> use them because they get the results they want."
>
> Doctors have far fewer disputes than cell phone companies, but Alan
> Schwartz, a plaintiffs' lawyer, still thinks malpractice victims do
> better in court. The arbitration system rules, he said, work against him.
>
> "I have to play my game in their stadium with their refs."
>
>
> http://www.philly.com/inquirer/business/homepage/20080210_Arbitration_a_growing_trend_in_health_car e.html
>