Medical Malpractice Update: Wisconsin’s Supreme Court Protects Patient’s Rights for Recovery

Despite thousands of patients who are injured each year while receiving medical treatment, the last decade has seen an increase in attempted medical malpractice reform. Most notably, this reform includes legislative initiatives to cap the amount of non-economic damages patients can receive in a medical malpractice action. This means that the money plaintiffs can be awarded on a case-by case basis to compensate them for their past and present pain, future suffering, disfigurement, embarrassment and loss of enjoyment of life can be significantly reduced.

For example, in May 1995, Wisconsin’s legislators passed one of those initiatives capping any plaintiff’s non-economic damages in a medical malpractice claim to $350,000 - regardless of the actual pain and suffering that patient had undergone and would undergo in the future.

Wisconsin resident Matthew Ferdon, now 8, who is partially paralyzed and has a deformed right arm as a result of an injury that occurred at birth, was no exception. After a medical malpractice action was brought on Matthew’s behalf against the doctor who delivered him, a jury awarded Matthew $700,000 in non-economic damages. Despite the money awarded to compensate Matthew for his non-economic damages, Matthew’s award was drastically reduced according to Wisconsin’s statutory cap.

Matthew’s reduction was appealed, and on July 14, 2005 Wisconsin’s Supreme Court struck down Wisconsin’s cap on non-economic damages in medical malpractice cases as unconstitutional. After examining the available evidence, the Court found that there was no rational basis for the cap of $350,000, concluding that the legislature’s faith in the cap was too speculative to justify a reduction in patient’s rights and that the statute unfairly distinguished between those victims who suffer more than $350,000 in non-economic damages and those who suffer less.

This decision is a victory for patient’s medical malpractice rights in Wisconsin.