LARAMIE - Placing caps on malpractice awards is not by itself the solution to the state's medical malpractice insurance cost dilemma, the incoming president of the Wyoming Medical Society said at a panel discussion Thursday.

Speaking before representatives of lawyers, doctors and insurers, Dr. Robert Monger of Cheyenne said, "Even if Wyoming were to enact reforms like Colorado's, it would not be enough."

"We can't piecemeal the system back together," Monger said. "Doing things like caps is not going to get there."

Monger was speaking before a thinly attended meeting Thursday sponsored by the Potter Law Club at the University of Wyoming College of Law. Colorado has limited malpractice awards to $1 million and awards for noneconomic damages to $300,000.

State Rep. Becket Hinckley, R-Cheyenne, who opposed a constitutional amendment to clear the way for capping damages, said Monger's statement was a "tectonic change" from the Medical Society's previous position favoring enactment of caps.

Wendy Curran, executive director of the Medical Society, said she did not agree that Monger's statement represented any major change from what the society has advocated. She said the society favors caps as a necessary short-term step, to be followed by broader long-term solutions to make the system more fair.

Monger, too, said in an interview, "I think we should have caps," but they would not be the final solution. He said he favors a no-fault system, so that doctors and their patients would be on the same side instead of being pitted against each other. Under the present system, he said, "We grossly under compensate people."

Monger, currently vice president of the society, is expected to take office as president July 1.

Jeff Brinkerhoff, a Casper attorney, said he did not believe insurance rates would go down without a cap. Brinkerhoff said a malpractice crisis in Wyoming "is imminent, if it is not already here."

Noting last month's decision by OHIC Insurance Company to stop renewing malpractice policies in Wyoming, effective Oct. 1, he said, "I don't think that is exactly coincidence."

Other speakers accepted the company's statement that the announcement was not prompted by the Legislature's failure to act on the issue, saying the company had dropped six other states also and was concentrating on its home state of Ohio.

Rhonda Woodard, a Cheyenne attorney and former lobbyist for trial lawyers, said a constitutional amendment "is absolutely not called for." Woodard said there is "no reason to believe that we are going to have a crisis here because of OHIC leaving the state."

If a no-fault system is adopted, she cautioned, "there are going to have to be stringent limits."

Susan Miller, an insurance company president, said doctors are leaving the state or retiring because of the cost of coverage. Jury awards have doubled since 1972, and claims have skyrocketed, Miller said.

One result, she said, is that there is only one trauma surgeon serving all of Northeastern Wyoming.

Amanda Hunkins, an attorney and lobbyist in Cheyenne, said the Wyoming Constitution forbids limiting a person's right to seek damages because at the time the constitution was drawn, the Union Pacific Railroad was powerful in the state.

Thomas Jobin, also a lobbyist and attorney, said, "The railroad was killing a lot of people" at the time.

Hunkins said there is no connection between medical liability insurance rates and caps on damages. She said rates have continued to go up in states that have adopted caps.

Jobin argued that capping jury awards "would take away the right to full recovery, and is just not right. Why would you do that to your fellow citizens? Why would you take away their rights?"