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An article published in Health Affairs entitled “Mediating Medical Malpractice Lawsuits Against Hospitals: New York City’s Pilot Project” discusses a feasibility study conducted with the New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation in which 29 lawsuits involving medical malpractice mediation were assessed.  The purpose of the study was to determine the plaintiff’s and defendant’s satisfaction level with medical malpractice mediation as an alternative for litigation in a medical malpractice lawsuit.  The results of the study suggest that everyone involved in the cases that were sampled found medical malpractice mediation to be an effective and useful form of alternative dispute resolution.

Authors Chris Stern Hyman and Clyde B. Schechter of Columbia Law School in New York City conducted the study and ascertained that satisfaction was high, even if a settlement was not reached in the process.  Among the sample cases, the average length of mediation was 2.34 hours.  Of the total number of sample cases, 13 were settled and the median settlement amount was $111,000.

One of the more interesting finds of this study is that attorneys from both sides of the dispute estimated that they spent approximately one-tenth of the time preparing for the case than it would have taken them to prepare for litigation.  Reducing attorney time and cost is one of the significant benefits to professional malpractice mediation, allowing disputants to not only achieve settlement quicker—but also at a much lower cost.  With court dockets that are often crowded, particularly in areas for which there are a high number of similar cases, medical malpractice mediation is often used as a cost-effective and time-saving alternative to litigation.

In a medical malpractice dispute, saving the image and reputation of a health care provider or facility is another high priority, making alternative dispute resolution methods like mediation a popular choice.  With absolute confidentiality and privacy, health care providers can use medical malpractice mediation to avoid the public eye that is always present in litigation.