John Mirabella Quoted in Article on Downturn in Med Mal Filings
(Philadelphia, PA)– Attorney John Mirabella of Duffy + Partners was quoted in a recent article on the status of Philadelphia Med Mal Filings in 2010.
In a February 25th, 2011 article, the Legal Intelligencer reported that the number of medical malpractice filings in Philadelphia Common Pleas Court fell to its lowest level in the last 10 years: 389 cases filed in 2010, down from 507 cases in 2009 and 1,352 in 2002.
One factor for the decline, the article offers, include reforms undertaken by the state Supreme Court and other branches of Pennsylvania government to require that medical malpractice cases be filed in the counties where the alleged malpractice cause of action arose and that cases be filed with a certificate of merit from a physician stating that there is a reasonable probability that a medical malpractice defendant deviated from the accepted standard of medical care. Other factors include the country’s economic state and its affect on juries seeming to indicate they are more inclined to award verdicts “in the most meritorious cases.”
In addition to several judges approached for their views on the issue, Mirabella, who is co-chair of the Philadelphia Bar Association’s Medical-Legal Committee and who focuses his practice entirely on issues related to Birth Injury, Medical Malpractice and Catastrophic Personal Injury, was the only attorney cited in the piece, offering that: "the statistics reflect a continued downward trend in medical malpractice filings, which was the intended effect of the judicial and legislative reforms enacted in the early 2000s. Unfortunately, there's no reason to think that patient safety has improved, only that claims are down."
The attorneys of Duffy + Partners focus their work exclusively in the areas of birth trauma; medical malpractice; professional malpractice; motor vehicle and trucking accidents; construction accidents; aviation law and aircraft disaster; premises liability; product liability and maritime accidents. The firm also represents patent holders in enforcement cases.