Have you considered making your matrimonial practice collaborative? That's the system currently gaining favor around the country whereby divorcing couples seek to resolve issues with the aid of collaborative attorneys who take part in discussions involving both divorcing parties and their attorneys.

Features

It never fails to amaze me. Educated professionals, usually of the legal variety, begin discussing the state of our civil justice system. A discussion of the adversarial system ensues. Debating what is wrong with it, or perhaps, (thanks to those 'half-full glass' types) ways in which it could be improved, is usually an animated segment of the discussion.

Features

Envision the following scenario, which is not necessarily commonplace, but not unheard of, either: Your client, the mother of a 9-year-old girl and two boys, aged 2 and 5, has been married for 14 years, most of them unhappy. Your client has been struggling with, and is being treated for, a series of psychological problems, including bipolar disorder, suicidal ideation and post-partum trauma disorder. The client has been a stay-at-home mother, attending to the demands of three children with busy schedules. Her marital problems have increased dramatically since the birth of the youngest child, to the point where she now believes the domestic discord is detrimental to her own as well as to her children's emotional well-being.

A plaintiff who alleges that lack of oxygen during a botched delivery caused a child's cerebral palsy might have a new obstacle to proving causation, if juries give credence to a recent report commissioned by two major medical organizations.

FloridaWin for Woman Claiming Abuse During Pap SmearA woman who claimed that a doctor molested her during a pap smear was awarded $280,000 by a Florida jury on February 27, 2003. Kathy Murphy, a 49-year-old painter and massage therapist, claimed that Dr. William Charles Leach, of Naples, FL, asked her to help perform a 'new pap smear technique' where she was required to massage her vagina. She claimed that the doctor masturbated near her. Leach did not attend the trial, and the plaintiff obtained a default judgment.

Doctors are increasingly making use of physician assistants (PAs) in their practices. In order to avoid liability, it has become imperative that physicians who do use these assistants establish and follow consistent protocols. This is important not only for the efficient and orderly functioning of the office, but to ensure that government regulations are met and that the patients fully understand the role of these professionals. Patients must be told that PAs are available in the practice, but that they as patients have the right to choose examination and treatment by either the assistant or the physician. Only following these protocols can the medical practitioner ensure the orderly function of the office, the satisfaction of the patients, and some degree of protection from lawsuits engendered by a less-than-perfect medical outcome.

Features

In a Philadelphia case in which a defendant doctor testified at trial that he believed there was a 20% chance that his patient's cancer had returned but that he did not do anything to confirm his suspicion until approximately 14 months later, the Superior Court ruled that a jury verdict for the defendant so 'shocked the conscience' as to merit a new trial.

Features

On January 16, 2003, President George W. Bush addressed Pennsylvania physicians at the University of Scranton: 'There are too many lawsuits filed against doctors and hospitals without merit. And one thing the American people must understand is even though the lawsuits are junk lawsuits, and they have no basis, they're still expensive.'