Mediating medical malpractice lawsuits against hospitals: New York City's Pilot Project.

The New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation participated in a feasibility study to measure the participants' satisfaction with mediation of medical malpractice lawsuits. Twenty-nine cases were referred to the study, twenty-four agreed to mediation, and nineteen were mediated. Satisfaction data indicate that the plaintiffs and their attorneys and the defendant's attorney were satisfied with the process whether or not settlement was reached. The mean length of a mediation was 2.34 hours. Of the cases mediated, thirteen settled, with a median payment of 111,000 dollars. The defendant's and plaintiffs' attorneys estimated spending approximately one-tenth the amount of time preparing their case for mediation that they would have spent preparing for trial.