Malpractice Damages Cap FAQs

Medical malpractice wrongful death cases require specialized knowledge, substantial resources, and the willingness to go up against well-funded hospital systems and insurance companies. At HBLG Law, we stay current on every development in Georgia wrongful death law — including rulings like Blasingame v. Cayamcela — so that we can build the strongest possible case for your family. Experience and preparation make a real difference in outcomes.

We handle wrongful death cases on a contingency fee basis, which means you pay nothing upfront and owe no attorney’s fees unless we recover compensation for your family. You can focus on grieving and healing while we focus on fighting for the justice your family deserves.

Georgia law measures wrongful death damages by the “full value of the life” of the deceased — which includes both economic contributions (earning capacity, household services) and noneconomic elements (the value of the person’s life to themselves and their family). Juries weigh many factors, including the deceased’s age, health, relationships, career, and life expectancy. With damages caps increasingly unenforceable, juries now have greater freedom to award compensation that truly reflects the magnitude of the loss.

Under Georgia’s Wrongful Death Act, the right to bring a claim belongs first to the surviving spouse. If there is no surviving spouse, the right passes to surviving children. If there are no children, the deceased’s parents may bring the claim. In some circumstances, the administrator of the estate may also bring certain claims on behalf of the estate itself.

In Georgia, the statute of limitations for a wrongful death claim is generally two years from the date of the deceased person’s death. Missing this deadline can permanently bar your family from recovering any compensation, regardless of how strong your case is. Contact an attorney as soon as possible to protect your rights.

Noneconomic damages are the non-financial losses that result from a loved one’s death. In Georgia wrongful death cases, these can include:

• Pain and suffering experienced by the deceased before death
• Loss of consortium — the loss of companionship, love, and support suffered by a spouse
• Loss of society and relationships suffered by surviving children or parents
• Emotional distress of surviving family members

These damages are separate from economic damages like lost wages, medical bills, and funeral expenses, which are not subject to caps.

Not entirely — but this ruling significantly weakens their enforceability. The Rockdale County Superior Court found Georgia Code Section 51-13-1 unenforceable on six independent grounds in this case. While this is a trial court ruling (not yet a Supreme Court decision), it is a powerful, well-reasoned order that defense attorneys will have difficulty overcoming. The legal trajectory in Georgia has been moving against damages caps since the Supreme Court’s Nestlehutt decision in 2010, and this ruling continues that trend.

Medical malpractice wrongful death cases are among the most complex in Georgia civil litigation. The stakes are high, the legal landscape is constantly evolving, and defense attorneys and insurance companies will use every available tool to minimize what your family recovers.

At HBLG Law, we represent families who have suffered the unimaginable loss of a loved one due to medical negligence. Our attorneys stay at the forefront of developments like the Blasingame v. Cayamcela ruling so that we can maximize the value of your claim and protect your rights at every stage of litigation.

If you have lost a family member due to medical malpractice, contact HBLG Law today for a free consultation. Time limits apply to wrongful death claims in Georgia, so it is important to act quickly.

Medical malpractice wrongful death cases arise when a healthcare provider’s negligence causes a patient’s death. Common causes include:

• Surgical errors
• Failure to diagnose cancer or other serious conditions
• Medication errors
• Anesthesia mistakes
• Hospital-acquired infections from negligent care
• Failure to monitor or respond to deteriorating patient conditions

The families left behind — spouses, children, parents — are entitled to seek compensation not just for financial losses, but for the profound noneconomic harm of losing a loved one.

This ruling is significant for Georgia families pursuing medical malpractice wrongful death claims for several reasons:

• Higher potential verdicts. Without an enforceable cap, juries can award the full measure of noneconomic damages they believe is appropriate — unconstrained by an arbitrary statutory ceiling.
• Defense tactics may be challenged. Defendants who try to invoke the cap late in litigation, as happened here, may find the argument waived.
• The constitutional landscape continues to shift in favor of plaintiffs. Courts are increasingly unwilling to allow statutory caps to override jury determinations in medical malpractice cases.

Waiver

The defendants waited until after the jury returned its verdict to raise the damages cap for the first time. The court found this was too late. By failing to identify Section 51-13-1 in the pre-trial order, defendants waived their right to invoke it. The plaintiffs had justifiably relied on the defendants’ representations and were prejudiced — they could have presented different evidence and requested a different verdict form had the cap been timely raised.

Lesson for families: Defense lawyers sometimes try to spring the damages cap on plaintiffs after trial. An experienced wrongful death attorney will anticipate and counter these tactics.

The Entire Statute Fails — It Cannot Be Severed

The court held that the unconstitutional portions of Section 51-13-1 — specifically the caps on pain, suffering, and loss of consortium — are so intertwined with the rest of the statute that the entire law fails. The legislature chose a narrow severability clause that only allows courts to delete words, not rewrite statutes. The court could not surgically remove the unconstitutional portions without essentially rewriting the law — something courts are forbidden to do.

Separation of Powers

Applying the cap selectively — only to wrongful death damages but not to pain-and-suffering damages as Nestlehutt requires — would require the court to legislate from the bench. The General Assembly intended an across-the-board cap on all noneconomic damages. The court refused to transform that into a “wrongful death only” cap, recognizing that such a fundamental policy change belongs to the legislature, not the judiciary.

Right to Jury Trial

The court held that applying Section 51-13-1’s caps to wrongful death noneconomic damages would violate Georgia’s constitutional right to jury trial — and reached this conclusion using three different constitutional reference dates (1798, 1868, and 1983), independently and alternatively.

At each of those dates, medical malpractice claims existed in Georgia, juries decided them, and juries determined noneconomic damages. Capping those damages post-verdict substitutes the legislature’s judgment for the jury’s — precisely what Georgia’s Constitution prohibits.

Equal Protection

The court found that applying the cap only to wrongful death noneconomic damages — but not to pain-and-suffering damages for patients who survived — creates an arbitrary and irrational distinction that violates equal protection under Georgia’s Constitution.

The court illustrated this vividly: two patients suffer the same injury during surgery. One survives and can recover full noneconomic damages for loss of enjoyment of life. The other dies, and their family can recover only up to $350,000. The legislature never drew this distinction, and applying the cap this way has no rational relationship to the stated legislative purpose of promoting quality healthcare and predictability.

Set-Off Denied

The court also reaffirmed its earlier ruling that the defendants were not entitled to a set-off from prior settlements with former defendants — rejecting what the court called a “windfall” for the remaining defendants.

Georgia Code Section 51-13-1, enacted as part of Senate Bill 3 in 2005, placed a cap on noneconomic damages — things like pain and suffering, emotional distress, and loss of consortium — in medical malpractice cases. For years, insurance companies and healthcare defendants used this cap to limit what injured patients and grieving families could recover, regardless of how severe the harm or how egregious the negligence.

The cap had long been controversial. In Atlanta Oculoplastic Surgery, P.C. v. Nestlehutt (2010), the Georgia Supreme Court struck down the cap as applied to pain-and-suffering damages, finding it violated the right to jury trial. The recent Turner decision from the Georgia Supreme Court left this holding undisturbed. The Rockdale court’s July 2025 ruling builds powerfully on that foundation.