Ohio has fewer obstetricians than five years ago

"Five years after a law trying to reduce the malpractice rates went into effect, Ohio has fewer doctors who deliver babies than at the height of protests about high costs." (Source: "Ohio has falling insurance rates, fewer obstetricians," Associated Press, March 23, 2008.) "Ohio had 1,327 doctors listing obstetrics and gynecology as their primary specialty at the end of 2007, a 5 percent decrease from 2002, according to an AP analysis of State Medical Board numbers. The overall number of doctors in Ohio rose during the same time, from about 28,000 to about 30,000. Those figures represent all doctors and not just those in high-risk specialties."

The 2003 law passed by the Ohio General Assembly capped jury awards for pain and suffering in medical malpractice cases at $350,000. Awards of up to $1 million were allowed in cases with multiple victims, which can include a mother and baby during birth. According to the Ohio State Medical Association, which supported the 2003 law, there are fewer obstetricians in the state because malpractice rates are still too high. Experts, though, say there are a "number of reasons why Ohio has fewer obstetricians, from rising medical costs of all kinds to the increasingly sophisticated technology used to deliver babies, which may be forcing old-style obstetricians to rethink the specialty."