Have you ever heard a wacky story about surgical instruments getting left inside a patient while they’re under anesthesia? Or the one about someone who was diagnosed with cancer when they really had something much simpler?
Unfortunately, these types of misdiagnosis or surgical errors are common issues. If you’ve never been the victim of a problem, consider yourself fortunate. At best, these cases are annoying, but at worst they can result in death or permanent disability.
Here are the most common types of medical malpractice claims.
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Childbirth Errors and Malpractice Claims
Modern medical technology and medicines have lower down birth injuries and deaths. However, we still witness doctors and other medical care staff making errors in routinely that the lives of mother and children at risk of a serious wound.
Mothers and infants can both suffer when OB/GYNs are negligent during delivery. Postpartum hemorrhage is a common problem, as well as infant distress and spinal injuries. These types of claims account for about a fifth of all medical malpractice suits.
If you suspect that you’ve been the victim of negligence, there is help available for filing a medical malpractice lawsuit. Contacting a malpractice firm would help you to recover birth injuries your child has gone through due to the negligence of health care professionals or the hospital.
Inadequate parental care leads to the possibility of birth injuries. A pregnant woman requires proper health care facilities. Mothers and infants deserve the best care, and medical issues like cerebral palsy can often be prevented.
Misdiagnosis Types of Medical Malpractice
One common type of medical malpractice claim is misdiagnosis when a physician diagnoses the patient with the wrong illness or fails to diagnose a problem. Often these can be life-threatening issues like heart attacks or strokes, as well as cancer and chronic diseases.
Misdiagnosis or delayed diagnosis errors give rise to illness, injury, incorrect treatment, or no treatment at all. When a patient are misguided about the medical condition it makes worst scenario, and they may even die.
If a doctor fails to refer the patient to a specialist, fails to test for certain symptoms, or interprets test results incorrectly, misdiagnosis can happen. This is why getting a second opinion is so helpful. Asking another doctor to look at the same evidence and clarify the findings is extremely helpful for patients.
Errors in Prescriptions
Have you ever been given too many pills when you picked up your prescription? Have you ever had a different prescription in the bottle than the one on the label? Have you ever been given someone else’s prescription?
Due to wrong calculation, a doctor sometimes writes a dose that is higher or lower than the right one or writing an incorrect prescription because of similarity in the name of drug brand or pharmaceutical names, lack of awareness of expiration date leads to serious medical health conditions.
Unfortunately, it’s a common problem. This is one of the most common reasons a medical malpractice lawyer gets called on to file a suit. These errors can hurt and even kill patients if they don’t notice the problem right away.
Surgical Errors
When surgeons performing the surgical operation fail to follow the proper standard of care or don’t pay significant attention to the treatment procedure then it causes big harm. Inefficient planning, inadequate skills, incomplete training, human error, and miscommunication are the big reasons of medical malpractice.
The number of surgical instruments or tools left inside a patient is staggering. Some studies estimate up to 1 in 1000 surgeries result in a sponge or tool being left inside a patient due to miscommunication.
Surgical errors include operating on the wrong part of the body, conducting the wrong type of surgery, accidental incisions, improper monitoring, instrument being left inside the patient, and using wrong surgical instruments, etc. Unfortunately, many medical malpractice settlements happen because of errors like these.
Problems with Anesthesia
Another very common malpractice case happens when there are errors in anesthesia. It is the part of a surgical procedure that involves extra care. Little negligence in providing of anesthesia can cause complex anatomical structures and metabolic parameters. Higher dosage can affect the brain waves to the extent that it could even lead to the death of a person.
Some doctors give the wrong dose, causing a patient to have trouble waking up or to wake up during surgery. Often a common call to a medical malpractice attorney is because of something as simple as a clerical error, resulting in a problem with anesthesia.
Hospital management should make sure to hire the best certified registered anesthesia specialist in the town. Providing anesthesia to the patients must be done by some highly experienced person to minimize any kind of uncertain outcomes.
You may also like: Types Of Personal Injury Cases
Unusual Circumstances
The types above are the five most common types of claims, but it’s not an exclusive list.
There are more medical malpractice claims than you might expect. Fortunately, the majority of medical treatments go without a problem.
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