‘Doctors, Lawyers and Greed’

In his letter (Aug. 16), “Doctors, Lawyers, Greed and Malpractice Suits,” Jack E. McCleary termed as “ludicrous” an opinion expressed by Murray Kempton in his column (Editorial Pages, July 22) that “If lawyers are greedy, they are the only instances of that vice with a fair claim to serve a social conscience inert everywhere else.”

Dr. McCleary protests that medicine as a profession does have a social conscience, but goes on to point out a serious problem--that of getting a “bad” physician off a hospital’s medical staff.

I submit that the trial lawyers may be the only segment of our society with sufficient “power” to successfully address medical malpractice. Certainly, physicians themselves have consistently demonstrated a reluctance to confront their peers in this area. Most, also, have been disinclined to devote the time necessary for close supervision of new and problem physicians or to provide the thorough documentation essential to substantiate evidence of unsatisfactory practice.

At the same time that physicians are unwilling to document problem situations with their peers, they are incensed when anyone else does. There are many different hospitals and nursing homes that have strong social consciences and have meticulously documented incidences of potential malpractice only to have these destroyed with no action taken and no copies of them placed in the problem physician’s hospital file.

Should these other health professionals attempt to pursue such a situation, they do so at the very real risk of losing their postions. Were the above situations to change, perhaps it would be less difficult than Dr. McCleary indicates to get a “bad” physician off a hospital’s medical staff and disciplined by the Board of Medical Quality Assurance. And then we might not need so many trial lawyers serving as the social conscience at so great a cost to everyone.

CHRIS MacDONALD

Long Beach