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08/26/2004: "Dogs chasing cars"

Let it be known I think almost as highly of Geoffrey Fieger as I do of His Royal Highness, Kwame. While I applauded his efforts with Jack Kevorkian's case, he since has shown himself to be little more than another slimy ambulance chasing lawyer.

I was highly amused last week when I saw him whoring himself in an add for the Highland Park schools.

I was not highly amused when I read today about his latest ambulance chase.

Don't get me wrong, I'm absolutely no fan of doctors who think they are god. (Just don't ask me about vaccinations and natural childbirth, I'll never shut up) On the other hand, I have a severe issue with personal accountability which is what drives me insane about lawsuits such as this one.

(cut due to the fact that it's a non-Detroit specific rant, which may offend large portions of people due to my inability to be tactful when sick with a cold)

Those who chose weight loss surery, no matter what they may say, make a choice for an elective surgery. Yes, their lives may be short if they don't lose the weight, but baring the small percentage of people who had some medical reason for a weight large enough for weight loss surgery (in which case the surgery likely wouldn't work in the first place) they had a choice to end up in their position. I know it's not easy, but it is still their own choice.

Those overweight enough to find a US based doctor to do the surgery (I amusingly enough found a website advertising said surgery from a nice clinic in Reynosa, Mexico. I think anyone stupid enough to consider that option simply needs a brain transplant.) are already at risk for higher complications in any surgery. A 5'6" body weighing 361lb, as Scott did is not normal - the heart is under stress, the lungs are under stress, the joints and bones are under stress.

This woman had an elective procedure carried out that had known risks - from the procedure itself (not even to begin the "40 years down the road" issues related to the likely rise in problems because of nutrients not getting absorbed correctly) to the massive amounts of germs and other crap that like to hang out in even "clean appearing" hospitals.

The Detroit City Council often appears to have 5 collective brain cells, however, I'm going under the assumption that Brenda Scott was educated and could perform basic research and ask basic questions.

The two doctors named in the suit, according to their website, had been performing lap band surgery for months at the time of Scott's surgery in 2002. (And in the case of Dr Boutt, he apprently hadn't done any by himself until October 2002, a month after Scott died)

Call me overly cautious, but if I'm going to have major surgery performed (or really, any surgery), I'm going to make sure that I had a doctor that had been performing said surgery for more than a few months. I'm not a guinea pig. In this time of doctor searching, I'd also be making quite sure the procedure was in fact warranted, the possible complications were acceptable risks, and my doctor could perform said surgery with his eyes closed if he had to.

At any rate, Scott knew the risks. She chose to go forward with those risks and ultimately, died.

Provided the doctors did not show complete negligence during or immediately after the surgery (as in "opps, sorry, accidently cut open your stomach and stitched you back up without repairing it" or "opps, spilled a bunch of shit into your body that we didn't clean out") there is absolutely no reason for such a lawsuit. None. Ziltch. I'm sorry her family is now without her but she was an adult. She had a brain. Things don't always turn out as we plan but just because they don't doesn't mean you get a shot at winning the $100 million lottery.

Lawsuits, such as the one brought by her family and the ones I see often in other ambulance chaser tv commercials that are not based on real merit of a doctor fuck-up ("Was your baby born with cerebral palsy? A c-section with higher risks of complications may have helped the outcome." - at which point they should add "even if studies show that in most if not all cases birth process has nothing to do with it."), are hardly the answer and I don't even want to think about people who treat them like a free money opportunity.

Because of ambulance chasers like Fieger, even if they don't all get $100 million per case, people like me pay for the astronomical malpractice insurance that doctors now must pay for. Which means ultimately that insurance costs rise, which means that those like myself don't even have insurance. It's a frightning thought for someone such as myself with a nice "little" problem like RSD which can't be "cured" by a single visit to a general practice doctor.

Rant over, I swear.