Medical Negligence
Medical professionals have a duty and responsibility to provide medical care and treatment within the accepted standard of care. Medical negligence may occur when a medical professional or health care worker harms or causes injury to a patient. Prescribing the wrong medication, failing to take into consideration a patient’s health history, or misdiagnosing a patient’s condition are some examples of medical negligence. You or your family may be faced with a lifetime of medical costs because of medical negligence.
Types of Medical Negligence Cases
The following are some examples of medical malpractice cases:
- Anesthesia Error: Licensed professionals who have completed extensive training are permitted to dispense anesthesia in order to ensure patient safety. However, sometimes anesthesia accidents occur. A patient may receive too much of a medication or a patient’s body may suffer a reaction to the medication.
- Physician Negligence: When a physician fails to act quickly or appropriately, writes a prescription indicating an inappropriate dosage, misdiagnoses a medical condition, or does not take a patient’s medical history into consideration, physician negligence may be to blame for any personal injury the patient suffers as a result. An example of physician negligence includes birth trauma. Physician negligence may happen because the physician is overworked, is sleep deprived, or for any number of other reasons.
- Medication Errors/Improper Medication: Prescribing the wrong drug to treat a condition, prescribing two or more drugs that can dangerously interact with one another, prescribing a drug to a known allergic patient, or prescribing the wrong dosage can result in serious harm or wrongful death.
- Improper Medication: There are many cases in which improper medication may be to blame for a patient’s injuries, including: medication that is not indicated for treatment of a medical condition, the patient has an existing allergy to the medication, a preexisting medical condition that precludes prescribing a medication, or the possibility of an adverse drug interaction. Health problems, severe allergic reactions, hypertension, and death are all possible results of improper medication.
- Misread Mammograms / X-rays: Radiology studies detect disease, broken bones and other serious health ailments. But, a misread x-ray or mammogram may lead to delay in diagnosis and treatment.
- Blood Transfusions: Exposure to contaminated blood and blood products may result in the development of serious diseases such as HIV and hepatitis.
- Negligent Amputation: Losing a limb to amputation is devastating, but when a physician carelessly removes the wrong one, the resulting physical and emotional trauma can be unbearable. Such careless surgeon error is the worst kind of medical malpractice and must not be tolerated.
- Emergency Room Negligence: Hospital emergency rooms are notoriously understaffed and typically filled to capacity, increasing the chances that you will receive substandard care. While most of problems are minor – long waiting times, discomfort and pain – many serious consequences can result, including permanent injury.
- Failure to Diagnose: Cancer is a disease that can be deadly if a physician fails to diagnose it properly. Failure to diagnose lung, breast, or colon cancer may result in delayed treatment that gives the disease time to spread, or no treatment at all that may lead to a death that may have been prevented. Failure to diagnose lung, breast, or colon cancer is a form of medical malpractice.
Before choosing any doctor it is recommend that you research them thoroughly. For example, most consumers interested in cosmetic surgery oftentimes spend more time researching the cost of liposuction or breast augmentation cost rather than the surgeon. By researching your doctor and finding one that is well qualified you can reduce the risk of something going wrong.
Medical Negligence Lawyer
If you or a loved one has been injured by medical negligence you may be entitled to compensation. It is important that you consult with an experienced medical negligence lawyer to learn more about your legal rights.