Austin team prevails in constitutional challenge to Texas non-economic damages cap

A team of lawyers from the Austin office prevailed in a lawsuit challenging Texas’ $250,000 statutory limit on non-economic damages in medical malpractice cases.

They represented the Texas Hospital Association alongside the state of Texas in a suit filed by multiple medical malpractice plaintiffs alleging that the state's noneconomic damages cap was unconstitutional because the Seventh Amendment required a jury to determine damages.

A bench trial was held before US District Judge Lee Yeakel in 2022. Last week, the court entered judgment for defendants, concluding that plaintiffs lacked standing because none of them had obtained a medical malpractice judgment against any defendant that had been reduced due to the statutory cap.  The court further rejected the argument that plaintiffs had been harmed by the statute because it decreased the settlement value of their claims, an allegation that was not adequately supported by evidence at trial.

This is an important case for the healthcare industry since about half of states have laws capping noneconomic damages in medical malpractice cases. These caps are credited with saving healthcare providers hundreds of millions of dollars in insurance premiums, increasing the rate of physicians per capita, and increasing the number of specialists willing to treat complex or high-risk cases.

The team was led by Yvonne K. Puig, Adam T. Schramek and Daphne Andritsos Calderon and included Nathan Damweber and Eric Hoffman (Austin).