More than 50 attorneys have signed up to chair medical review panels as called for in a new state law.
Actual panel hearings on medical malpractice complaints are still several weeks away.
The Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family Services is responsible for setting up medical review panels.
Cabinet Deputy Secretary Tim Feeley says the law calls for the process to “go live” the end of June. “The first complaint could be filed on the 29th and the first panel would be getting together probably 30 days thereafter, after we go through all the steps of appointing people and giving chances for strikes,” said Feeley.
Claimants and defendants will be given a list of five names with the ability to whittle it down to one chairperson.
Non-voting lawyers will chair the panel comprised of three medical experts.
Feeley says the panel then has several months to determine if the malpractice claim can proceed with a civil suit filing.
“There will be a nine-month window in which they need to get the information together and then making a ruling of whether or not the claim is one that showed a violation of standard of care, or a violation of standard of care with no negative effect or no violation of standard of care,” explained Feeley. “Those will be the three choices that the panels will have.”
Feeley says he’s been advised a similar law in Indiana has helped to lower malpractice insurance costs for medical providers in that state.
