Research Program
Tort Law & Medical Liability
Overview
I study medical malpractice and tort law, including apology laws, punitive damages, liability rules, medical devices, and malpractice safe harbors. This work examines how liability rules affect behavior, risk, compensation, patient safety, and health care.
Selected Scholarship
Developing Safe Harbors to Address Malpractice Liability and Wasteful Health Care Spending
James F. Blumstein, Benjamin J. McMichael, and Alan B. Storrow
JAMA Health Forum, 4(11): e233899 (2023).
Bringing Predictability to the Chaos of Punitive Damages
Benjamin J. McMichael and W. Kip Viscusi
Arizona State Law Journal, 54(2): 471–525 (2022).
Negligence, Intentional Torts, Professional Liability, and Medical Malpractice
Benjamin J. McMichael
Laws of Medicine: 129–149 (2022).
Insuring Apologies
Benjamin J. McMichael
Florida State University Law Review, 48(3): 651–718 (2021).
Healthcare Licensing and Liability
Benjamin J. McMichael
Indiana Law Journal, 95(3): 821–881 (2020).
Responses to Liability Immunization: Evidence from Medical Devices
Elissa P. Gentry and Benjamin J. McMichael
Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, 17(4): 789–819 (2020).
Constraints on Medical Liability Through Malpractice Safe Harbors
James F. Blumstein, Benjamin J. McMichael, and Alan B. Storrow
JAMA Health Forum, 1(8): e200961 (2020).
COVID-19 and State Medical Liability Immunity
Benjamin J. McMichael, John R. Lowry, William H. Frist, and R. Lawrence Van Horn
Health Affairs Forefront (2020).
“Sorry” Is Never Enough: How State Apology Laws Fail to Reduce Medical Malpractice Liability Risk
Benjamin J. McMichael, R. Lawrence Van Horn, and W. Kip Viscusi
Stanford Law Review, 71(2): 341–409 (2019).
Taming Blockbuster Punitive Damages Awards
Benjamin J. McMichael and W. Kip Viscusi
University of Illinois Law Review, 2019(1): 171–221 (2019).
Shifting Liability with Licensing: An Empirical Analysis of Medical Malpractice and Scope-of-Practice Laws
Benjamin J. McMichael
Journal of Tort Law, 12(2): 213–253 (2019).
The Failure of “Sorry”: An Empirical Evaluation of Apology Laws, Health Care, and Medical Malpractice
Benjamin J. McMichael
Lewis & Clark Law Review, 22(4): 1199–1281 (2018).
Beyond Physicians: The Effect of Licensing and Liability Laws on Nurse Practitioners and Physician Assistants
Benjamin J. McMichael
Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, 15(4): 732–771 (2018).
The Extraregulatory Effect of Nurse Practitioner Scope-of-Practice Laws on Physician Malpractice Rates
Benjamin J. McMichael, Barbara J. Safriet, and Peter I. Buerhaus
Medical Care Research and Review, 75(3): 312–326 (2018).
The Punitive Damages Calculus: The Differential Incidence of State Punitive Damages Reforms
Benjamin J. McMichael and W. Kip Viscusi
Southern Economic Journal, 84(1): 82–97 (2017).
Worried About Malpractice?
Benjamin F. Byrd III, Jim Cooper, and Benjamin J. McMichael
Journal of the American Society of Echocardiography, 29(12): 1161–1162 (2016).
Shifting the Fat-Tailed Distribution of Blockbuster Punitive Damages Awards
W. Kip Viscusi and Benjamin J. McMichael
Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, 11(2): 350–377 (2014).
Data, Code & Interactive Research
Approved public datasets, replication materials, figures, and interactive research may be collected here where available.