Each year, the ASA Committee on Professional Liability provides a report on changing trends in malpractice insurance premiums and characteristics impacting physician anesthesiologists. The Anesthesia Closed Claims Project conducted a survey of malpractice insurers from May-July 2016 on behalf of the committee. Twenty-eight medical liability insurance companies providing coverage to more than 19,500 anesthesiologists practicing in the United States responded to the query.
Consistent with the committee’s 2015 report, insurance companies conveyed that most anesthesiologists continued to carry policy limits of $1 million per occurrence and $3 million per year.1 In 2016, 64 percent of companies reported that their most common policy had limits of $1 million/$3 million, 32 percent reported that their most common policies had higher limits, and 4 percent (n=1 company) had lower policy limits ($100,000/$300,000). Three quarters of companies offered claims-made policies either exclusively or for the vast majority of their policyholders, while 21 percent...
