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Senate advances compromise medical malpractice bill with $450,000 cap and affidavit-of-merit requirement
Summary
The Senate advanced a third substitute of Senate Bill 145 to limit non-economic damages at $450,000 and require affidavits of merit after pre-litigation panels. Sponsors said the measure narrows nonmeritorious suits while opponents pressed for safeguards and for the stand-down agreement to be memorialized.
Senator Adams, the bill sponsor, urged colleagues to support a third substitute of Senate Bill 145 designed to narrow nonmeritorious medical-malpractice litigation while preserving relief for meritorious claims.
“This bill puts a hard cap … and leaves it at $450,000,” Adams said on the floor, summarizing the substitute’s core provisions and explaining that it removes the inflationary element from the existing cap.
The third substitute also requires an affidavit of merit after the pre-litigation panel process; the affidavit must be provided by a healthcare professional showing a legitimate cause of action before a case can proceed. Adams and other supporters said the changes stop nonmeritorious suits while allowing meritorious claims to move forward and preserve remedies for injured patients. The sponsor also described clarifications to ostensible agency language so that suits against some nonemployee providers would not be automatically imputed to hospitals.
Senators from both sides praised the extensive negotiations that produced the substitute. Senator Valentine and others noted an agreement among parties including the Utah Medical Association and Utah Association for Justice. Some senators requested the parties’ side agreement be memorialized as intent language so the body could refer to its terms in future years.
Opponents and cautious supporters urged transparency and asked whether a multi-year stand-down arrangement would be enforceable or should be placed in the legislative record; the sponsor said he was open to memorializing the agreement as intent language without binding future legislatures.
Floor action moved the third substitute forward: the motion to read the bill for the third time passed, and the third substitute was placed at the bottom of the third-reading calendar after the recorded vote (24 yeas, 1 nay). Sponsors characterized the measure as a compromise reached after extensive bargaining among plaintiffs’ and medical-interest stakeholders.
The bill will return to the floor for third-reading final passage on the scheduled calendar. Supporters said the measure balances the interests of plaintiffs, defendants and insurers; opponents said any cap and procedural barriers should be weighed carefully for access to justice.
