Massachusetts Passes Health Care Cost Control Bill

A newly enacted law in Massachusetts will adopt the "disclosure, apology and offer (DA&O)" approach to help resolve malpractice cases. The Healthcare Cost Control Bill recently passed by the Massachusetts legislature and signed by Gov. Deval Patrick on August 6 contains specific language that facilitates a DA&O approach to medical malpractice claims.

Under the DA&O model healthcare professionals and institutions and their insurers:

• Disclose to patients and families when unanticipated adverse outcomes occur
• Investigate and interpret what happened
• Establish systems to improve patient safety and prevent the recurrence of such incidents
• Apologize, where appropriate, 
• Offer fair financial compensation without the patient  having to resort to legal action.

Changes include provisions for a six-month, pre-litigation resolution period that affords the time to go through a DA&O process with sharing of all pertinent medical records by the patient, full disclosure by providers, and for statements of apology by providers to be inadmissible in court.

Under the DA&O model, healthcare professionals and institutions and their insurers disclose to patients and families when unanticipated adverse outcomes occur; investigate and explain what happened; establish systems to improve patient safety and prevent the recurrence of such incidents; and, where appropriate, apologize and offer fair financial compensation without the patient having to resort to legal action. Patients will always have the right to consult an attorney to advise them of their rights and to evaluate the fairness of any offer or to bring legal action if they so choose.