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Claims severity continues to rise in U.S. health care facilities: Study

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Claims severity continues to rise in U.S. health care facilities: Study

A study released by Zurich North America on Wednesday finds claims severity continuing to rise at U.S. health care facilities, while claim frequency has remained stable.

According to the ninth annual Zurich Healthcare Risk Insights benchmark study of hospital professional liability claims, claim severity has increased markedly since the study began.

“Average severity for years 2003 through 2006 remained stable, but it has increased relatively steadily since then,” the study states. “With respect to (severity) trends, the implied long-term average annual trend was approximately 6% for the five-year period from 2006 to 2011, and 2% annually for the period 2003 to 2006.”

The study, which uses data from Zurich's database of 331,000 hospital professional liability claims from 50 states, also found regional variability in severity, with Illinois, New York and Pennsylvania exhibiting claim severity higher than the national average.

The study also examined severity by facility type, finding that teaching and children's hospitals have claim severity much higher than other types of facilities.

“For children's hospitals, the cost of providing medical care over a child's lifetime is a possible contributing factor, which we believe may be further complicated by the general interest rate environment,” the study states. “For teaching hospitals, the care provided to patients tends to be very complex and may carry higher risk along with it.”

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