News & Media
Tort Tutorial Part Three
The Current Standards
This series will explore Michigan's tort reforms and professional liability laws, which have played a crucial role in maintaining a stable practice environment for physicians across the state. With looming threats of legislative changes, it's vital for today’s physicians—many of whom were not practicing during the last reforms—to understand the potential destabilizing impact on patient care and the workforce. As Michigan faces an existing physician shortage, these discussions will serve as both an education and a call to action to defend the laws that protect the future of healthcare in the state.
Michigan's medical liability laws underwent significant reforms in the 1990s, introducing lasting changes in three key areas: joint and several liability, non-economic damage caps, and expert witness requirements.
Joint and Several Liability
Prior to the reforms, Michigan law followed the principle of "joint and several liability," meaning an injured party could sue any one of the responsible parties for the full amount of damages, regardless of the individual defendant’s level of fault. This placed a heavy burden on one defendant, even if they were minimally at fault.
In 1995, Michigan introduced "fair share liability," which eliminated joint and several liability for most personal injury, property damage, and wrongful death cases. Now, each defendant is responsible for paying damages proportional to their level of fault. However, joint and several liability still applies in medical malpractice cases and for other cases involving gross negligence or crimes involving alcohol or controlled substances where the defendant was convicted.
Non-Economic Damage Caps
Caps on non-economic damages, which compensate for pain and suffering or emotional distress, were introduced for medical malpractice and product liability cases.
For medical malpractice, a 1993 reform set a cap of $280,000 for non-economic damages. This cap increases to $500,000 if the plaintiff suffers severe injuries, such as hemiplegia, paraplegia, or quadriplegia. These caps are adjusted annually based on inflation. As of 2024, the higher cap had risen to $1,016,000, and the lower cap to $569,000.
Expert Witness Requirements
Prior to reform, expert witnesses could testify in medical malpractice cases as long as the court found them competent, based on their ability to help the jury understand the facts.
The 1993 reform imposed stricter requirements for expert witnesses in medical malpractice cases. Experts must specialize in the same field as the defendant and have been practicing or teaching in that specialty for at least a year before the alleged malpractice occurred. The 1995 reforms added further rules, requiring courts to evaluate the reliability of expert testimony using seven criteria, including whether the expert’s opinion had been tested, published, and accepted by peers in the relevant field, among other factors.
These reforms aimed to ensure fairer allocation of liability, limit excessive damage awards, and improve the quality and credibility of expert testimony in medical malpractice cases.
The next part in the series will look at current court cases and challenges to these laws. Click to catch up on Part One and Part Two.