As used in this article:

(1) "Accumulated deficit" means the amount that the association's and the fund's liabilities exceed their assets, as reported in the association's and fund's respective most recently reported financial statements on June 30, 2019.

(2) "Association" means any joint underwriting association established by the General Assembly in 1987 and managed and operated pursuant to the provisions of this article.

(3) "Fund" means the Patients' Compensation Fund.

(4) "Future deficit" means any deficit accumulated by the association and fund after the most recently reported financial statements as of June 30, 2019.

(5) "Licensed health care providers" means physicians and surgeons, nurses, oral surgeons, dentists, pharmacists, podiatrists, hospitals, nursing homes, or any similar major category of licensed health care providers. The term "licensed health care provider" also includes blood centers which collect, process, and distribute blood to hospitals and physicians for the care of patients if these blood centers as of July 1, 1997, were insured with the Joint Underwriting Association.

(6) "Medical malpractice insurance" means medical professional liability insurance or insurance protection against the legal liability of the insured and against loss, damage, or expense incident to a claim arising out of the death or injury of any person as the result of negligence or malpractice in rendering or failing to render professional service by any licensed physician, licensed health care provider, or hospital.

(7) "Net-direct premiums" means gross-direct premiums written on medical malpractice insurance, medical professional liability insurance, hospital professional liability insurance, and any other type of professional liability insurance covering risks of licensed health care providers and facilities as determined and computed by the director or his designee, less return premiums or the unused or unabsorbed portions of premium deposits. The net-direct premium calculation does not include premiums written by the fund.

HISTORY: 1987 Act No. 155, Section 1; 1988 Act No. 306, Section 1; 1993 Act No. 181, Section 830; 1997 Act No. 62, Section 2; 2019 Act No. 67 (H.3760), Section 1, eff May 16, 2019.

Effect of Amendment

2019 Act No. 67, Section 1, inserted (1), relating to "Accumulated deficit" and redesignated (1) as (2); in (2), inserted "by the General Assembly in 1987 and managed and operated"; inserted (3) and (4), relating to the definitions of "Fund" and "Future deficit", and redesignated former (2) to (4) as (5) to (7); in (5), in the first sentence, deleted "chiropractors," following "pharmacists,"; and rewrote (7), relating to the definition of "Net-direct premiums".