I have a good friend who is a very competent board-certified OB-GYN and a man who loves delivering babies. Unfortunately nowadays, delivering babies is fraught with a lot of medical legal problems. This is one of the big reasons why Cesarean Sections are performed so frequently. Any problem that occurs at the time of birth is more easily defended if the patient had a cesarean section, rather than a standard delivery.

This doctor was recently sued and when you he met with his attorneys to discuss the case, it turns out that his attorney had represented him previously in a malpractice case. The attorney told him "Doc, I can't believe you are still delivering babies. Don't you realize that this is the profession with the highest litigation risk of all the occupations there are.. You should not be delivering babies, because of the malpractice risk. I can't believe you are still delivering babies", The doctors only reply was, I went into the practice of medicine, because I love delivering babies and bringing new life to the families. And I really don't want to give that up.

To my knowledge, he is continuing to deliver babies and enjoy that part of his practice. I don't know how much longer he is going to be able to do this. But it's nice to know that there are still some doctors who do what they really want to do, and not be turned off by the medical legal threat.

It so happens that I bumped into this man at a social event recently. He told me that he is no longer delivering babies because of the malpractice threat. He also said that one of the HMOs that he was delivering babies for informed him that he was considered the number one OB man as far as competency, patient satisfaction, and service for the patient and family. They also told him at that time, they were going to reduce his compensation by 20%.