Hit ‘Delete’ to Prevent EDD Disaster | Law.com | 8.7.07
[Plaintiff:] Gary Michelson, M.D., a spine surgeon and prolific inventor, with hundreds of patents and patent applications worldwide, primarily in the field of spinal fixation and surgical implants, instruments and methods.
[Defendant:] Medtronic Sofamor Danek Inc., a subsidiary of Medtronic Inc., manufactures and markets medical devices used to treat spinal conditions.
Discovery was extensive…44 million pages of e-data…thousands of requests for admission…nearly 70 depositions taken in the case. Medtronic produced more than 2 million pages of paper documents and over 500 gigabytes of electronic data…
Medtronic estimated at one point during the litigation that the EDD processing and review would cost approximately $16 million to $22 million dollars — all to find, retrieve and review evidence that was helpful to [the plaintiff].
EDD is a growing strain on companies, law firms and solo attorneys. Better electronic record management is critical to keeping costs under control — and all companies should remember to “take out the trash.” If a company does not need the ESI for business, regulatory or litigation reasons, it should be discarded.
The verdict in this case was for $570 million. On the high side the defendant’s burden for discovery production was almost 4% (of the verdict award). As physicians and healthcare move towards the “holy grail” of an EHR—so does the problem of ESI loom larger. Moving paper to ESI may be the easy part—and a trade up in the size of the noose.