According to a recently filed federal class-action lawsuit, New York City’s public housing agency is violating the rights of tenants with disabilities when they fail to maintain elevators in the buildings under their jurisdiction, which renders them stranded for hours during recurrent breakdowns.
To put this issue into perspective, the Housing Authority, provides low-rent apartments which are subsidized by the federal government to poor and moderate-income families. It maintains 3,338 elevators in 2,618 buildings.
The lawsuit, brought on behalf of a group of tenants, accuses the agency of “widespread and systemic failure to maintain the elevators in its buildings in operable working condition.” This is a clear violation of disability and human rights laws.
Wilma Brito lives on the 10th floor of a building in the Carver Houses in Harlem. She has Cerebral Palsy and relies on a motorized wheelchair. When both elevators in her building stopped working for three days last month, she couldn’t leave her apartment. When that happened three years ago, she was stuck outside her building when she arrived there at 7 p.m. It took over five hours until one of the elevators was functioning again. During that time, the batteries on her wheelchair died.
Debbie Bacote is another tenant in the lawsuit. Aged 52, she is paralyzed on her left side and uses a wheelchair. When the two high-rise elevators that serve her 18th floor apartment stalled, she was forced to walk down several flights of stairs. While a friend carried her wheelchair, her home attendant walked in front to prevent her from falling. She held onto the railing for dear life, so she could get to the low-rise elevators which took her to her doctor’s appointment.
The dangerous situation in these elevators has been the focus of increased attention since the death of 5 year old Jacob Neuman who fell 10 stories down a shaft after trying to escape from a stalled elevator at a Brooklyn complex. In that tragedy, the elevator stalled due to electrical problems which experts believe resulted from faulty maintenance.
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Ricardo Elías Morales, the Housing Authority’s chairman, while not willing to comment on the specifics of the lawsuit said, “The vast majority of our elevators are safe and provide the kind of service that they’re supposed to.”
He announced immediate plans to overhaul the elevators in a matter of weeks. Since the Neuman boy’s death, there have been several improvements. Inspection teams have been expanded and a budget of $107 million has been allocated to replace 550 elevators by 2014.
Mr. Morales admitted that several of the elevators are in need of immediate repair, and his plan deals with that need. Somewhat defensively he pointed out that during a recent meeting between his staff and the Disabilities Network of New York City no one mentioned the problem with elevators.
He also pointed out that during an elevator breakdown, tenants who have difficulty walking or who use wheelchairs should call the agency and arrange to have a stair-lift machine brought in. He didn’t mention how long it might take for the machine to arrive and what number a stranded person should call if they need that kind of help.
Even before Jacob’s death, residents at many of the city’s 340 complexes complained about elevators. According to the Housing Authority, a public housing elevator breaks down on average once a month. The resulting delay in service can be 10 hours.
Phyllis Gonzalez who suffers from arthritis and other health problems, who is also party to the lawsuit, refers to both elevators being disabled in her public housing building as “double-headers.” Ms. Gonzalez lives in a 12th-floor apartment and uses a wheelchair. She recalled having to descend 12 flights of stairs sitting on one step at a time during a double-header.
The lawsuit is being handled by the nonprofit N.Y. Legal Assistance Group and the high power Manhattan law firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, which is providing its services free of charge. Rather than seeking monetary damages, the lawsuit is trying to win a court order which would require the agency to maintain elevators in working condition, repair them quickly, fix them effectively to avoid repeated breakdowns and provide accommodations for residents who are wheel chair bound or can otherwise not use the stairs when the elevators are not working
According to Jane Greengold Stevens, director of litigation for the N.Y. Legal Assistance Group, at least 7,000 public housing tenants are mobility impaired who have been “deprived of the full use of their homes by elevator failures.”
The office of Scott Stringer, Manhattan’s borough president who has been working with the lawyers, is constantly receiving phone calls from tenants complaining about faulty elevators. Somewhat bitterly he notes, “if an upper east side co-op had these elevator problems, no one would stand for that”. But since these issues are occurring in housing for the poor, it takes much longer to get effective action.”

According to the Manhattan District Attorney’s office, Steven Rondos, a New York attorney who had been appointed to oversee the assets of incapacitated clients, is accused of pocketing $4 million for personal use. His clients included children suffering from Cerebral Palsy.
The 44 year old N.Y. lawyer and his law firm, Raia and Rondos, are charged with grand larceny, money laundering, and scheming to defraud. He apparently defrauded 23 vulnerable clients and the estate of one deceased individual.
Rondos’ contact with his alleged victims started when he was appointed by New York judges to manage the assets of his younger Cerebral Palsy clients who had received generous settlements when it was proven that they were victims of medical malpractice at birth. His other clients were adults and the elderly who suffered from mental and or physical impairments.
The Manhattan D.A’s office contends that Rondos used his unsuspecting client’s money to cover the mortgage payments for his New Jersey home and on extensive home renovations, outdoor landscaping, and installing a home theater.
If convicted, Rondos faces up to 25 years in prison. In addition, prosecutors are suing him and his wife and law firm partner Camille Raia, for asset forfeiture.
Rondos did not answer the phone and did not return messages.

Judge Jonathan Durham Hall who recently presided over one of the most difficult cases n his career, sentenced the three thugs who were convicted of brutally attacking an innocent and defenseless disabled man to a total of 34 years in prison. He regretted the leniency of the punishment blaming in effect legislation that prevented him from ordering Life Sentences for the horrendous crime they had committed.

He described the attackers, Andrew Law aged 18 who he sent to young offender’s institution for 12 years, Jonathan Jackson, aged 19 and Andrew Gorton, aged 21, both of whom were sentenced to 11 years each, as depraved, sadistic, brutal and evil.

The three carried out their dastardly act after getting drunk, attacked Damien Shepherd on Burnley Road, Todmorden, “for the fun of it”, leaving him with a brain injury and in a wheel chair. They admitted that they knew he was disabled and had actually assumed he was dead and left him in that condition on the pavement.

The judge accused the three of carrying out this brutal attack because they did not like what Mr. Shepherd and the vulnerability that his disability represented. He characterized them as being depraved, sadistic, brutal and evil in that they shattered the life of another human being.

The prosecutor in the case, Nadim Bashir, described how the three bullies pushed 43 year old Mr. Shepherd to the ground, dragged him and brutally kicked him. He arrived at the hospital unconscious and bloodied. He sustained a severe traumatic brain injury and was so badly bruised that he spent a month in intensive care. Today, nearly four months after the attack, Mr. Shepherd still requires an exceptional amount of care.

Due to the beating he sustained, Mr. Shepherd was unable to give evidence in the case. In statements prepared by his sister, and read in court, she described that he had been unconscious for two weeks and had no memory of the attack and of his former life.
After carrying out a crime of this nature one would assume that the people involved would be totally devoid of any conscience, but fortunately that proved not to be the case. Several days after the attack, on May 3rd, Andrew Law approached law enforcement officers and admitted his part in the crime. Not long after, Jackson and Gorton were brought into custody.

During the course of the trial, there was testimony regarding a similar incident involving these three men. A week prior to the attack on Mr. Shepherd, the gang attacked a 25 year old cyclist, Thomas Croft in nearly the same spot. In the event, they knocked him off his bike with the intention of beating him up but he managed to get away from them. He stopped a car hoping to get help only to discover that these three thugs were in the car, whereupon they beat him up.
They admitted to attacking the cyclist. Jackson and Gorton admitted intentionally taking part in the attack on Mr. Shepherd. Gorton’s attorney Ian Howard said that his client “holds himself in perhaps more contempt than the judge” Adrian Strong, Law’s attorney explained that the reason he turned himself into the police was because he could not live with himself knowing what he had done. Jackson’s attorney, Alexander Wolfson said: It is impossible to hear Ms Shepherd’s (sister of the victim) statement and not cry.
Speaking after the trial, Det Insp Tony Nicholson, of Calderdale CID, shared some of his thoughts on the case. He said that the brutality and cowardly nature of the attack on a vulnerable man who suffered from such an apparent physical disability by three physically healthy young men literally disgusted the officers who had been involved in the case.

He then noted that the beating inflicted upon Mr. Shepherd was of a nature that he will carry the scars until he dies. In an unusual move, the police officers have established a close relationship with the Shepherd family. He expressed the hope that the jail sentences would provide a modicum of comfort to them.
On the sentence, Mr. Nicholson added that he hoped they would serve as a lesson to other young men to be ware as to how they “get their kicks” after they get drunk. People who think that beating up on others is just one way to have fun, will end up paying for their “good time” in a measure far beyond their joy.

It is now months after the attack and Mr. Shepherd is still in rehabilitation where his sister, who says the attackers ruined his life, visits him regularly. The attack devastated his life and hers and she feels the events that have transpired have taken a big part of his life away from him. Before the ordeal he battled against the cerebral palsy to achieve a sense of independence. Now all of that has been lost. She is bitter about the fact that after they complete their prison sentences, the three men who did this will be able to gom about their lives. Damien will never be the same.

She described seeing him at the hospital after he was brought in. The huge cut along his face, his fractured skull and eye socket made him unrecognizable. She didn’t believe he would make it out of the ordeal alive.

The medical teams were devoted and gave him the special care he required. After a month in intensive care at Royal Oldham Hospital he was transferred to a high-dependency unit for another four weeks. Afterwards he was sent to a rehab centre at Calderdale Royal Hospital and then to Rakehead in Burnley, whre he is currently recuperating.

Miss Shepherd feels that the mental scars her brother has are comparable to his physical injuries. Before the attack he was talkative and very affectionate and he loved to take his dogs out for a walk around Todmorden. He is completely changed now. This once lively and happy man is quiet and withdrawn. His former brilliant memory is now very poor.
Fortunately he doesn’t remember anything connected to the attack, at least he doesn’t have that to torture him.

Niall Monks an eleven year old boy who suffers from cerebral palsy and other birth defects, was awarded €2.8 million in an agreed settlement stemming from his birth at the Coombe hospital in Dublin. The settlement which was reached under the aegis of the High Court and approved by Mr. Justice Michael Hanna, did not address the issue of the hospital’s liability in the matter.
The case was characterized by fundamental disagreement between the expert medical witnesses brought by the opposing sides concerning the facts of the case. It was because of this that the Monk’s lawyer, Denis McCullough SC recommended that they agree to the sum being offered by the hospital, despite the fact that there was no admission of liability on their side.
Niall, who’s right arm is severely affected by Erb’s palsy in addition to having cerebral palsy, and who is totally dependent upon his parents for his mobility, brought this legal action through his mother, Maria.
In presenting the boy’s case, Mr. McCullough gave Niall’s date of birth on the 16th of July, 1997, at Coombe Hospital. He claimed that Niall had suffered shoulder dystocia – a condition in which the anterior shoulder of the infant cannot pass through the birth canal as it is prevented from moving past the mother’s pelvis. This he further claimed contributed to the oxygen distress, resulting in brain damage, all of which came about from mismanagement of his birth. This they claim could have been prevented if

1. The baby’s heart beat had been properly monitored during all stages of his birth and,
2. Competent medical assistance had been brought in on this complicated case.

Defendant’s Counsel argued that Niall had been born dead but was resuscitated, denying all claims of mismanagement of the birth
Mr McCullough argued that if the case would have been tried by a full hearing, and if he had succeeded in proving all of his claims, the resulting damages would have reached €5 million.
Coombe offered to pay Niall 65 per cent of that amount. Dr. Roger Clements was convinced that the settlement sum of €2.8 million was very fair..
After considering all of the opinions offered by the opposing “experts”, Mr. Hanna said had no hesitation in approving the settlement.
For her part, Mrs. Monk admitted that their family was pleased with the verdict.

Significant budget cut in state funding in Florida’s state capitol are resulting in dramatic cuts in services for hundreds of disabled men, women and children on the First Coast .
According to Jacksonville Legal Aid attorney Sarah Sullivan, who has joined several other lawyers who are filing appeals to the State Agency for Persons with Disabilities, people suffering from autism, cerebral palsy and various levels of mental retardation are facing serious levels of service cut backs.
Budget cuts and reduced services take on a startling reality when translated into how they affect real people. Danielle Dowe is a 23 year old who is severely physically and mentally handicapped. According to her mother, Sharon, Danielle functions at the level of a 6 month old infant. In addition she suffers from life-threatening tonic clonic seizures.
Danielle is a person, not a statistic, but that doesn’t prevent the State legislature in Jacksonville from cutting funding for Danielle and many hundreds of other severely disabled people. Unless Sarah Sullivan and her lawyer colleagues are successful, these cuts will take effect before the beginning of the winter.
Jim Whittakar is the director of The Arc Jacksonville which provides services to over 400 special needs individuals. His real concern is trying to determine which of the vital services he and his staff are currently providing their clients can be eliminated or curtailed without resulting in a loss of life. He estimates that 60% of the people under his care will be affected. Sarah Sullivan correctly refers to these “as the most fragile and dependent people in the state”.
In Danielle Dowe’s case, the immediate effect would be that she cold no longer be cared for at home by her mother and would instead be placed in a group home. Anyone with the least common sense can understand that no state institution could possibly provide Danielle with the loving care that she is now receiving from her own mother!
So, Sharon Dowe has enlisted the assistance of legal services in appealing the budget cuts. Sarah Sullivan who is leading the battle has appealed to other lawyers to join legal services to volunteer their time, knowledge and expertise in doing ‘pro-bono’ work to help the Dowe’s win this battle. Sullivan admits that although legal services can’t pay volunteers in money, the lawyers can benefit from rewards that far exceed the monetary value of their work. “Ultimately”, she points out, “we can prevent someone from being placed in an institution”. And that to Ms. Sullivan is the greatest reward of all!
With assistance and moral support from people like Sarah Sullivan, is it any wonder that Sharon Dowe, after 23 years of sacrifice and love, doesn’t feel intimidated by the power of the State authorities.

If your child suffered a birth injury as a result of negligence or medical malpractice, you should be knowledgeable about what experienced birth injury attorneys can do to mitigate the suffering you are experiencing.
With the increase in advanced technologies and medicines medical practitioners are using today, birth defects are becoming increasingly prevalent. Regardless of weather it is a major or minor birth defect, an injury lawyer can help! You may well discover that you are entitled to compensation for the years you or a loved one has suffered. Your birth injury lawyer will help you decide on the most appropriate legal action to take, from advising and helping you file a class action lawsuit to pursuing an individual injury lawsuit. Regardless of how big and intimidating the defendant is, your Maryland birth injury attorney will help get you the results you are entitled to.
While having a baby is often one of the happiest times in your life, this can change dramatically if something goes wrong. Medical malpractice can result in irreversible injuries to your infant. For instance, a relatively common injury caused by carelessness and medical error can result in a child being born with cerebral palsy.

Cerebral palsy is caused by abnormalities which occur in the parts of the brain that control muscle movement. These abnormalities can cause the child to lose muscle coordination. These symptoms are not necessarily apparent immediately upon birth. In fact it can take months or even years for C.P. to be diagnosed.

If you feel that you were a victim of poor or less than careful medical care while you were giving birth and this resulted in your child suffering from a birth injury, you need to contact a competent and experienced birth injury lawyer. Your lawyer will ask you about the birth itself as well as the entire pregnancy. They will need to examine all of the medical records that document what happened during the pregnancy as well as the labor and birth, as well as your post-birth visits to the doctor. After speaking to you and learning all the details concerning your baby’s birth, your lawyer will interview your doctors and the attending medical staff. At this point a competent lawyer will be in a position to determine if you have a legal malpractice case. If you do have a valid case, your birth injury lawyer will set about getting the best compensation package that you are entitled to.
In the state of Maryland there is a particularly talented team of birth injury attorneys who trained both as physicians as well ad lawyers. Their firm specializes in cerebral palsy cases, and they have tried cases and arranged very significant settlements throughout the U.S. They can recover the very expensive medical payments you had to make before you realized that you were victims of malpractice, as well as the millions of dollars of expenses that will accompany your child throughout his life. When you are forced to confront the tremendous problems that C.P. can present, that can cause you, your ailing child and your family so much suffering and grief, contact the birth injury legal team which can help solve the tremendous financial burden you are facing..
To learn more about what you may be entitled to, visit www.askthelawdoc.com one of the country’s most celebrated and respected birth injury teams.

Twenty-seven year old Jonathon Khairule from Tile Hill Coventry has more than his share of physical disabilities. He suffers from cerebral palsy which renders him wheel-chair bound. His only means of communication is typing on a keyboard which he does with his nose.

Yet he had a kindly visit recently from “lady luck” in the form of a landmark High Court victory, which, in delivering a very compassionate decision, allowed him to pursue legal action against Tameside General, the hospital in Ashton under-Lyne, Lancashire, he believes is responsible for his severe disability.

In its defense, the hospital argued, with more than a little justification that the time had long passed for Mr. Khairule to bring a claim against them. And the law does state that personal injury claims must be brought within 3 years. For birth injuries, the 3-year clock starts ticking from the person’s 18th birthday. So he seemed to find himself between a rock and a very hard place.

Jonathon, who plans to begin his studies in Virtual Engineering this month (September), knew that he had C.P. from birth, but he just assumed that it was something which could not be avoided and that no one was at fault for his illness. When he was in his early twenty’s, he started looking into what had happened, more to understand rather than looking for compensation. Since he was already 21 years of age, no one was willing to get involved because of the 3 year limit on personal injury liability.

Irwin Mitchell was the only legal office that was willing to even try litigation on his behalf, and they too warned him that it would be an uphill battle. What they did discover was that there appeared to be serious concerns about the possibility of medical malpractice in the way his birth was handled, and they hoped that would prove enough of a mitigating circumstance to convince a judge to hear the case, notwithstanding the passage of three years.

Lindsay Gibb, the medical negligence specialist at the Irwin Mitchell office explained that Jonathon had first contacted their office in February 2004 which was more than a year and a half after his 18th birthday. On the surface, this was way beyond the time he could initiate a claim against the hospital. However the judge does have significant discretion to overlook the three year rule in a case where the judge is convinced that dis-allowing the 3 year rule would be fair and a fair trial could still happen.

This past July (2008), the High Court agreed with Mr. Khairule’s claim and issued a ruling paving the way for suit to be brought against the Strategic Health Authority.

According to Craig Straw, chief deputy in charge of civil rights in the city of Philadelphia’s Law Department, in the last decade, only 67 child-abuse lawsuits were filed against the Department of Human Services. Child-abuse cases are typically filed as civil-rights cases. This is about ten percent of the police-brutality cases filed in the same period, and a tiny fraction of the over 1,600 lawsuits filed against the city in fiscal year 2008. Of those 67 child-abuse lawsuits, 16 were settled with payouts totaling $2 million, 7 remain open and 44 were dismissed without payment.

The case Danieal Kelly serves as a perfect example. Kelly who had been in the care of DHS and a private contractor hired by the agency, who had cerebral palsy, died in August 2006, when she was 14 years old, suffering from severe malnutrition and bedsores.

According to Shaw, the reason so few cases are filed against the authorities is that ”these are hard cases to win. A plaintiff has to prove that DHS is accountable for abuse or a death caused by someone else, such as a parent or foster parent.”

A sad example is that of Porchia Bennett, in which the estate of a 3-year-old girl who died of multiple beatings, asphyxiation and malnutrition claimed that a DHS worker failed to act on her behalf. In 2003, the case was dismissed.

According to some experts, another possible reason there are so few child-abuse cases, is that the victims are too young to sue and the guilty parties are often the parents. In the absurdly paradoxical circumstance of the Danieal Kelly case, the parents who are being blamed for her neglect were the ones who initially filed suit.

During the same ten year period in Philadelphia, there were 652 lawsuits alleging excessive force by members of the police. While Shaw did not have figures on how many of these cases were settled and/or thrown out, he said that the city paid $13.3 million to litigants.

According to Harvey Rice, first deputy city controller, the largest settlement in the last decade in a child civil-rights case in the last 10 years was a $1 million payout.

Rice described other hair-raising examples of ineptitude and neglect of DHS which is supposed to care for the young people who are its often unfortunate charges:

An 8-year-old girl identified in court records as T.J. was assaulted by John Aloysius Lyles III, a convicted bank robber, whom DHS had considered a “good caregiver”. T.J. contracted HIV after the assault:

In 1995, 4 year old M.B., was raped by a man living in the home of her foster mother working for Women’s Christian Alliance, which received children placed through a contract with DHS. The city settled with M.B.’s aunt in 2003 for $500,000. The aunt was awarded an additional $2.8 million in a federal suit against the alliance.

In 1999, a 3-year-old boy was found naked and battered with a broken leg in the basement of his Port Richmond house. His godparents were awarded $275,000. The boy’s mother, Andrian Huymaier, was sentenced to 15 to 34 years for child abuse.

The boy’s attorney, Patricia Hoban who a personal injury lawyer in Center City in addressing the issue of monetary compensation for children who suffer this type of abuse, explained, “Children can never be fully compensated for injuries inflicted by adults. A child’s innocence is taken, and then you throw some dollars at him and say, here, this is to make up for all the shortcomings.”

She said, “In cases like these, an attorney has to show that DHS consistently did not follow normal procedures.

Leonard Fodera, a Center City trial lawyer, who represented the aunt in the M.B. case added, “You can’t go forward with the rogue-employee theory — that one person at DHS was acting outside the norm. You must prove that maltreatment was widely known and ignored.”

In 1993, DHS paid $1.6 million to the estates of four foster children who were killed when a fire destroyed the home of their foster parents Rose and Hubert Artis, in 1989. The Artis’ also paid $1.6 million. Lawyers for the city held DHS accountable in this case for not following its own regulations for foster home inspections.

In 1990, the A.C.L.U. filed a class-action suit against DHS on behalf of several children, including Baby Neal, an infant who was born in 1990 with syphilis and with cocaine in his system, alleging that abused and neglected children were systematically denied their civil rights. In response, DHS promised to institute improvements and allow monitoring by private advocates for two years.

Still, it is difficult to determine if lawsuits make a difference in the way DHS operates.

According to Frank Cervone, who, in addition to serving as executive director of Support Center for Child Advocates, a program of volunteer lawyers working for abused children, was an attorney on the Baby Neal case, “We tried to fix neglect in a DHS system which is designed to remedy neglect of family and parents. In 1990, DHS didn’t know where the kids they were supposed to be caring for were, and their case loads were dramatically high. As a result of the lawsuit, caseloads were reduced and DHS workers were better trained.”

”At the same time”, he added, “lawsuits tend to make an agency defensive, which can hinder efforts to self-correct.”

Leonard Fodera believes that under the new commissioner, DHS was seriously trying to be the best they can.

If you live in New York State and are planning to have a baby, there are certain counties you should stay away from: Essex, Greene, Seneca, Tioga, Washington, Yates, Schoharie, and Hamilton. According to the Center for Health Workforce Studies, these 8 counties don’t have obstetricians. Another of the Center’s alarming findings: 18 counties in N.Y. State have fewer than 5 ob-gyns. If this continues, women may soon start asking: who will deliver their babies? And lest you think this is strictly a problem that affects the “Empire State”, over 1,500 counties in the U.S. don’t have a single obstetrician.
Fact: While it has never been a safer time to have a baby, it has never been more dangerous to be an obstetrician. During the last four decades, medical innovations like ultrasound and fetal heart rate monitoring devices have revolutionized the field of obstetrics, and other advances have virtually eliminated potentially devastating fetal medical disorders. This has resulted in a dramatic drop in debilitating diseases that had once been the predictable result of complicated pregnancies. These technological advances have reversed the potential threat to the health of new born children which might have occurred given the fact that an increasing number of women are having children at an age which is much older than their mothers and grandmothers.
The down side is the negative statistics for professionals in the field of Obstetrics care. Fact: The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists recently released a study which determined that approximately 90% of the obstetricians have been sued at least once in their careers. A decade ago the statistic was 75%. No l;ess disheartening to those beginning their professional careers, nearly 40% of obstetrical residents are forced to defend at least one claim filed against them while they are training. It is no wonder then that nearly 65% of ob-gyns decided to change their professional specialty due to the fear of liability claims or litigation.
The most common cause for malpractice lawsuits against ob-gyns is brain damage to infants, specifically in the occurrence of cerebral palsy. Although it sounds very cynical, especially given the fact that few cases of cerebral palsy are in any way even remotely connected to the birth process, but families who have a C.P. child will inevitably have substantial financial needs, for medical care, therapy, and other services for their special children. And since options for outside financial assistance are limited, it should come as no surprise that such families seek assistance from the courts. Most experts agree that there is very little that can be done to prevent cerebral palsy and at best all that can be done can result only in minimizing some of the risk factors in a very small percentage of cases. That accounts for the rate of caesarean deliveries in the U.S. which has soared over the last three decades partially due to the defensive tactics that doctors have been taking in an attempt to avoid birth related malpractice suits.
But unfortunately the rate of caesarean births 30% in 2005 nearly 5 times the rate in 1970 has not helped reduce the numbers of C.P. births – approximately 1 in every 500 births. The courts have become like a lottery for medical injury victims. Very few win large amounts, but most receive nothing. According to the Harvard Medical Practice Study based on data gathered from New York hospitals, there is no judicial reward for most birth injuries. Even where the plaintiffs are successful, nearly 60% of the money won will go to pay administrative costs such as lawyers, expert witnesses and many other costs, leaving the patients and their families the balance.
So we are now not surprised that the number of ob-gyn’s is rapidly decreasing throughout the U.S. at an alarming degree. Since obstetricians face liability for brain damage outcomes that they are powerless to prevent, this raises medical malpractice premiums, and it creates an environment which is distinctly unfavorable for doctors caring for pregnant women. Thus, a high percentage of obstetricians are opting out of the practice and fewer medical school graduates are pursuing ob-gyn as a specialty.
A case in point is the story of Dr. Ronald Uva, a member of an obstetrics group and chief obstetrician at the local hospital in Oswego, N.Y., who has dekivered over 7,000 babies in his 30 years in practice. According to Dr. Uva, “It is almost impossible for me or my colleagues to continue to practice obstetrics. I tried to stop practicing at age 55 to spend more time with family, but my group could not recruit a single obstetrician and my partners would have had to work every other night in the hospital. My group is still trying to recruit. No luck — not one decent candidate. There are really no obstetricians for hire. Also, high medical liability rates make it almost impossible for me to give care to the underserved.”
The consensus is that New York’s citizens and physicians should be better off than this predicament allows. One solution currently being discussed is a program jointly financed by insurance and public support which would provide wide-ranging monetary benefits to all eligible children who suffer from neurological injuries, based on an approach similar to worker’s compensation. This program would remove these cases from the judicial system.
It would work in the following way. Instead of filing a claim in court, all eligible families could obtain monetary assistance from this administrative system. To insure the efficacy of the system, oversight would be provided by reliable and independent experts, who would determine a rational process for awarding benefit payments. Every child would undergo case management evaluation in order to determine the level and degree of assistance that each family’s entitlement. Once determined eligible, the children would gain access to the services they required for the rest of their lives.
The program would also have a very decisive educational and disciplinary component. It would address patient safety (a task traditionally assumed by the courts), and would perform a detailed review of the competence of the medical care in each case. Where instances of malpractice were uncovered, those responsible and found negligent would be disciplined according to a set of established guidelines. The end result would be to provide the necessary teaching and education to all obstetrical caregivers in the state
This approach could actually distribute compensation more equitably on a state-wide basis to more children, more quickly and efficiently as is the case in Florida and Virginia which have similar programs. Programs in those two states have already reduced the costs of birth-related injuries. Administrators are convinced that granting this type of financial support will result in significant savings in the future. More important, it will also provide a lifetime of vital medical, social and other services to these needy children and will substantially reduce doctor’s insurance premiums and ultimately improve the quality of medical care throughout the state.
Legislation intended to begin formulating this type of program has already been introduced in the State Senate in Albany during the past session. It is now up to our elected officials to endorse this rational proposal and finally bring a sense of order to the obstetrics health care providers and to the families in the State of New York.

Res-Care, an international human service company, which provides job training and educational support to people with developmental and other disabilities, has announced its intention to collect over $8 million it is claiming from the New Mexico departments of Health, Human Resources and Children, Youth and Families, for canceling its contract with the company in 2006.

The company, which claims it has been providing services to New Mexico’s developmentally disabled for more than ten years, filed its complaint in the U.S. District Court in Albuquerque the end of July this year.

Res-Care, which is based I Louisville, Ky., and operates in 37 states across the nation, claims that it was paid $15.3 million for services rendered in 2005.

Concurrently, the company is being sued in 2 separate law cases stemming from allegations of inadequate care and staffing. In one case, the guardian of a disabled man claims that a staff member of the company sold the person methamphetamine. Methamphetamine is a very addictive stimulant drug that affects the central nervous system. It is a Schedule II stimulant, which means it has a high potential for abuse and is available only through a prescription that cannot be refilled. When this incident was discovered, the state promptly cancelled Res –Care’s provider agreement in July of ’06 and moved clients to other care providing companies.

Res-Care’s lawsuit claims the following:
1. The contract was ended without due process;
2. Under state and federal law, in the event a Medicaid provider is ended without cause, that provider is entitled to receive notice of what the state claims the company did wrong, and is entitled to an administrative hearing giving the provider the opportunity to present witnesses in its defense, to question and cross-examine witnesses. The company is then entitled to appeal to a state district court in the event that the administrative court finds against them;
3. The letters of termination of service issued by the state did not contain notice of the company’s entitlement to an administrative appeal;
4. The state failed to pay $5 million in services es-Care provided and $3 million for costs incurred in connection to the cancellation of the work contract.

Res –Care has been operating under contract since 1994 until the time the contracts were terminated. It is claiming reimbursement for providing care to its clients. These clients include individuals with mental retardation, autism, cerebral palsy and other disabilities.