Medical Mistakes Can Equal Medical Malpractice

You want the best medical care possible. You get a second opinion just to be sure. You put your trust and faith in your medical professionals. After all, they went to school for years studying anatomy, drugs and their possible interactions, diseases, chemistry, and you didn’t. You expect them to know how to do their job.

Should that trust and faith be broken, and you sustain injuries, it could be medical malpractice.

Medical malpractice is making medical mistakes. Medical mistakes can include a wide range of situations. Here are just a few of the more common types of medical malpractice claims:

· Anesthesia: Administering anesthesia prior to and during surgery requires a very unique understanding of the both the drug and patients’ ability to handle it. If the wrong amount of anesthesia is given to the patient, it can lead to serious complications, even death on the operating table.

· Surgical Errors: Any surgery comes with risks but those risks shouldn’t have to include incompetence or negligence on the part of the surgical staff. Surgical errors can include operating on the wrong area of the patient, performing unnecessary or incorrect surgery, and leaving surgical instruments in the body.

· Failure to Diagnose: It is estimated that the failure to diagnose a condition constitutes roughly 40% of all medical malpractice claims. The most prominent failure to diagnose claim is for cancer. It can also include a delayed diagnosis or under-diagnosing a condition (i.e., misreading the signs and symptoms exhibited by the patient).

· Nursing Home Abuse/Neglect: Medical malpractice claims in this situation are generally based on physical abuse or neglect. Elderly patients receiving substandard care are often deprived of food, medication and inadequate hygiene assistance. This kind of treatment frequently leads to malnutrition, starvation, additional illnesses or death.

· Wrongful Death: This can often occur in part due to anesthesia or surgical errors. But a wrongful death medical malpractice claim can also be associated with a failure to diagnose, as in the case of cancer.

Other areas of medical malpractice include giving patients the wrong medication, emergency room errors, child birth injuries (i.e., cerebral palsy) and general improper procedures and treatment.

Medical mistakes don’t happen to everyone, but they do happen. Be sure you know the history of your medical professionals. Don’t be afraid to get a second opinion if surgery is recommended. Knowing your own family history can help your physicians understand your own health better. Investigate any nursing home you might be considering. Check with the appropriate health department for violations and complaints. Your trust and faith can be rewarded if you take the time to educate yourself along the way.