The ecology of defensive medicine and malpractice litigation

27Citations
Citations of this article
37Readers
Mendeley users who have this article in their library.

Abstract

Using an evolutionary game, we show that patients and physicians can interact with predator-prey relationships. Litigious patients who seek compensation are the 'predators' and physicians are their 'prey'. Physicians can adapt to the risk of being sued by performing defensive medicine. We find that improvements in clinical safety can increase the share of litigious patients and leave unchanged the share of physicians who perform defensive medicine. This paradoxical result is consistent with increasing trends in malpractice claims in spite of safety improvements, observed for example in empirical studies on anesthesiologists. Perfect cooperation with neither defensive nor litigious behaviors can be the Paretooptimal solution when it is not a Nash equilibrium, so maximizing social welfare may require government intervention.

References Powered by Scopus

Human cooperation

1018Citations
N/AReaders
Get full text

Defensive medicine among high-risk specialist physicians in a volatile malpractice environment

985Citations
N/AReaders
Get full text

Malpractice risk according to physician specialty

861Citations
N/AReaders
Get full text

Cited by Powered by Scopus

Defensive medicine in Europe: a ‘full circle’?

38Citations
N/AReaders
Get full text

How defensive medicine is defined in European medical literature: A systematic review

28Citations
N/AReaders
Get full text

Defensive medicine, liability insurance and malpractice litigation in an evolutionary model

15Citations
N/AReaders
Get full text

Register to see more suggestions

Mendeley helps you to discover research relevant for your work.

Already have an account?

Cite

CITATION STYLE

APA

Antoci, A., Maccioni, A. F., & Russu, P. (2016). The ecology of defensive medicine and malpractice litigation. PLoS ONE, 11(3). https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0150523

Readers' Seniority

Tooltip

PhD / Post grad / Masters / Doc 7

54%

Professor / Associate Prof. 4

31%

Lecturer / Post doc 1

8%

Researcher 1

8%

Readers' Discipline

Tooltip

Medicine and Dentistry 12

63%

Economics, Econometrics and Finance 3

16%

Arts and Humanities 2

11%

Psychology 2

11%

Article Metrics

Tooltip
Social Media
Shares, Likes & Comments: 2

Save time finding and organizing research with Mendeley

Sign up for free