Triage is the sad art and science in deciding which medical cases are more serious than others. Hospitals have to make triage decisions all the time, and sometimes they make the wrong ones. This can lead to malpractice suits. In a suit filed in West Virginia, a mother and child…
There is a long-standing tension between doctors and malpractice lawyers over tort reform. A recent survey from Medscape asked doctors their opinions on what should be done to reform the medical malpractice system. The most common suggestion was to implement pre-trial screening panels. A pre-trial screening panel would investigate malpractice…
When a patient that comes into a hospital, doctors have to make many choices in deciding treatment. Sometimes those choices are clearly incorrect. Others are correct but carry risks that patients must be advised on. Before those procedures can be done, consent must be gained. A possible confusion over consent…
An important part of any medical procedure is consent. If you go in for surgery, part of the process is signing a consent form to allow the hospital to operate on you. But if something goes wrong during that surgery, you may be eligible for a malpractice claim. A couple…
When a loved one is at the end of their life, it can be very difficult to determine whether a doctor’s actions are malpractice, or if the patient is only suffering through the inevitable despite the effort of the doctor. Cases like these without a clear-cut answer can end up…
Lawyers do their best to present cases before the court, but not every case that is presented goes to trial. Sometimes a malpractice case will be dismissed before it is heard by plaintiffs who discover additional information about their cases they didn’t know before they filed. This is called voluntary…
It can be helpful for people who are about to undergo major surgery to be aware of which specialties have the highest rate of malpractice claims. Medscape does an annual review on why doctors get sued and which professions are seeing increases or decreases in claims. Here are some statistics…
Suffering from medical malpractice is more than just about getting recompense for pain and suffering. It can prevent people from going to work. When an injured person is unable to get income it can cause a cascading effect that can threaten homes, families, and relationships. A famous rock musician in…
Humans aren’t the only ones that can be part of a medical malpractice suit. Veterinarians can also be sued for malpractice as well. Here is an example of this that happened in late November. A pure-bred dog was taken to a vet for dental problems. Seven of the dog’s teeth…
In yesterday’s article we talked about the relationship between malpractice insurers and their doctors. One unfortunate case in New Jersey shows what can happen when things go really wrong. Here are the details. In 2010, a patient had surgery on his foot. The surgery was botched badly, with the patient’s…