Posting malpractice payout records evokes big outcry in North Carolina

The North Carolina Medical Board has proposed posting all malpractice payments going back seven years as part of a new effort to broaden the kind of information patients can see about the doctors who treat them. Several critics, however, voiced opposition to the idea during a public hearing before the board on June 30. The board will use the comments from its hearing, along with e-mail messages and letters it has collected, to determine how it will publish the malpractice awards. In 2007, the North Carolina legislature gave the board the go-ahead to publicly post the payments but left it up to the board to decide what criteria to use.