WASH. COMMISSIONER ENDS MED MAL PROGRAM:

Washington Insurance Commissioner Mike Kreidler announced March 22 that he is closing the voluntary Market Assistance Program for medical malpractice insurance due to a lack of business. Kreidler pointed out that the availability of medical malpractice insurance is improving and costs are beginning to go down. The MAP will cease taking new applications effective March 31. Kreidler requested the creation of a voluntary market assistance program to assist physicians and medical providers who were having difficulty finding medical malpractice insurance. Under the MAP, participating insurers formed a voluntary partnership with local insurance agents and brokers to shop applications for coverage among each other to determine which insurer was best suited to accept the risk. More than half of the applicants to the MAP–32 of 62–were successfully placed with one of the participating liability carriers. Most of the physicians and medical providers unable to obtain coverage through the MAP were denied for prior claims histories or gaps in coverage. Only two doctors applied for assistance in the last eight months. In early 2002, nearly 1,300 physicians and medical providers had to find new coverage when the state’s second largest med mal insurer, Washington Casualty, announced it would no longer offer liability insurance to physicians. The St. Paul Group also had withdrawn from the medical liability market nationwide. The Office of the Insurance Commissioner assisted in finding new coverage for hundreds of health care providers before the MAP was formally created in July 2002.