In Barry v. St. Mary’s Hospital the Plaintiff treated at Defendant – St Mary’s – for injuries he sustained in a car wreck. The defendant asserted 3 liens against the Plaintiff’s personal injury claim which he had against a third party who was not involved in this case. The defendant eventually submitted two of the three bills to Plaintiff’s health insurance. The third remained a lien on the Plaintiff’s personal injury case. Plaintiff filed suit against St Mary’s claiming several things, including consumer fraud, third party beneficiary, and breach of contract. In this lawsuit, the plaintiff claimed that the defendant must Read more…
Category: Liens on Personal Injury
The appellate court recently held that offset language in uninsured / underinsured policies with plaintiffs injured by two defendants does not apply. Throwing out the offset language is counterintuitive to most lawyers. Lawyers are taught that you apply the language of the contract. This case reminds us that the terms of the insurance policy are applied generally, but that there are exceptions to general statements. In Tufano the court held that the policy holder must be placed in the same position as if each tortfeasor carried the same as amount of insurance as the injury victim. Furthermore, one tortfeasor’s payment cannot be Read more…
In McRoberts v. Porter, the Appellate Court considered the application of the Health Care Services Lien Act and its application to uninsured/under-insured claims. The Health Care Services Lien Act provides that any healthcare professional who renders any service in the treatment, care, or maintenance of an injured person…should have a lien upon all claims and causes of action of the insured person for the amount of the healthcare professionals or healthcare providers reasonable charges up to the date of payment of damages of the injured person. The total amount of liens, under this act, however, shall not exceed 40% of the verdict, judgment, Read more…
In an interesting case under the Healthcare Services Lien Act, calculation of healthcare liens rising from a personal injury suit was decided by the Court of Appeals. In the case of Stanton v. Rea, the plaintiff was a passenger in a car driven by someone named Rea, when Rea’s car collided with a car driven by Roe. Plaintiff filed suit, incurred hospital bills over $4,000.00. The case went to trial against one of the negligent drivers. The jury awarded damages in the amount of $13,506.80. The trial court entered judgment for that amount plus $3,919.79 in costs. The out of pocket expenses Read more…
Governor Quinn has signed an amendment to the Healthcare Services Lien Act. It creates a reduction in liens for comparative fault, insufficient liability insurance or a combination of the two. We discussed the changes at length here.
The Illinois legislature recently passed a bill to limit recovery of subrogation claimants. House Bill 5823 has passed both chambers and now goes to the governor’s desk. It is expected that the governor will sign the bill. The bill says, to paraphrase, that subrogation claims are limited to a pro rata share of the amount recovered. The bill does not apply to workers’ compensation claims, medical provider’s lien, or to uninsured/underinsured claims. Subrogation claims may now be reduced by a petition with the court. Claims of entities that have not made a claim may be adjudicated. The lien is now reduced by Read more…