less than some imaginative estimates put forward
in the
health reform debate, and it represents a small fraction of total
health care spending."
Of the $55.6 billion, $45.6 billion is due to defensive medicine, mostly in the form of hospital as opposed to physician services. Settlements and court judgments chalk up $5.72 billion, administrative costs such as legal fees contribute another $4.1 billion, while the value of lost clinician time is $200 million.