Political Malpractice
The AMA ignores doctors’ orders.

By NR’s John J. Miller & Ramesh Ponnuru
July 30, 2001 4:10 p.m.

ow well does the American Medical Association represent its members? It's a question Michael Catanzaro raised in National Review earlier this year. Now comes new evidence that the leadership of the organization is out of touch with doctors, in the form of a recent survey of 300 doctors who belong to the AMA.

The AMA dismissed the poll as propaganda from the HMO lobby (it was conducted for the American Association of Health plans). It may also be worth noting that the poll was done by a Republican polling firm (Ayres, McHenry & Associates). But most of the questions seem fairly worded, and the results plausible for anyone who's spent much time with doctors.

Asked which of four policies the AMA should make its "top legislative priority," a 39 percent plurality voted for a cap on damage awards in medical malpractice cases. Only 17 percent answered "making HMOs and other health plans subject to new lawsuits" — the centerpiece of the "patient's bill of rights," which has been the AMA's actual priority.

Another question asked, "Would it be a good idea or a bad idea for doctors' groups to form an alliance with trial lawyers — to pass laws exposing health plans to more lawsuits — even if it meant putting aside efforts to reform the medical malpractice system?" This is, of course, what the AMA has done. But 74 percent of the sample said it was a bad idea. And 91 percent of the sample thought that the AMA "should be working vigorously to pass a patient protection bill that includes medical liability reform for physicians."

In other findings, 50 percent of the AMA doctors said they had voted for George W. Bush while only 24 percent said they had supported Al Gore. (The rest didn't vote, voted for another candidate, or refused to answer.) Is Bush's stand on the patient's bill of rights hurting him among AMA doctors? According to the poll, he has a 64 percent approval rating.

You can judge the poll for yourself at www.aahp.org.

Correction

The July 20 Washington Bulletin mistakenly reported that Sens. Arlen Specter and Tom Harkin favor federal funding of the creation of human embryos for research purposes. In fact, they favor federal funding for 1) research on stem cells taken from embryos and 2) the extraction of the stem cells (which destroys the embryos). Specter's bill, of which Harkin is a major co-sponsor, would allow federal funding for research on stem cells taken from human embryos that were created by private parties for research purposes. But the bill would bar federal funding for the actual creation of the embryos. We regret the error. Not as much as we regret the bill, but we regret the error.