Surgical Error Lawyer, Baltimore
A Surgical Error Lawyer in Baltimore from Greenberg Law Offices knows that when patients consent to surgery, they are placing a great deal of trust in the professional experience, conduct, and decision-making abilities of the surgical team. When this trust is broken and surgical harm befalls a patient, the aftermath of this can be truly disorienting. It can be difficult to know why the harm occurred and how to respond to it. Sometimes, a patient may suspect that the surgeon and/or hospital behaved in a negligent way and should be held accountable for making a mistake.
However, it can also be difficult to determine whether the harm a patient has suffered resulted from a mistake or from the “common” risks associated with surgery itself. As a result, it is important to seek the guidance of a Baltimore Surgical Error Lawyer if you either suspect negligence or are unsure about whether a preventable surgical error contributed to the harm you are currently suffering.
Consulting with Greenberg Law Offices can help to clarify your situation and protect your legal options.
Human Error
While doctors spend many years getting trained in their field, they are human too and sometimes make mistakes. Some mistakes are categorized as medical malpractice, while others are not. In general, if a physician upholds his or her legal duty of care to the patient and treats them with a professional standard of care associated with his or her specific practice, a mistake may not be treated as malpractice.
It can be difficult for patients to determine whether a specific mistake did or did not result from negligence and/or recklessness. An experienced Baltimore, MD Surgical Error Lawyer can help to clarify this matter as it pertains to your particular case. If you have grounds to file a legal claim, we can help to provide necessary support and guidance throughout the claims process.
What if I don’t like the results of my surgery?
Not liking the results of your surgery is not generally a viable claim for medical malpractice, unless the results of your surgery were the result of professional negligence. For example, your doctor should explain all risks to you before you undergo surgery so that you may provide informed consent. However, if your doctor did not clearly explain these possibilities before your procedure began, this may be a sign that negligence has occurred.
What are some examples of medical malpractice?
Medical malpractice is known to be somewhat of an umbrella term, with more specific examples including:
- Misdiagnosis
- Birth injuries
- Medication errors (prescription errors, knowingly prescribing expired medications, or prescribing medications that will not treat a condition)
- Delayed diagnosis
- Use of recalled or ineffective medical technology machines
- Lack of post operative care
- Failure to treat
- Anesthesia errors
- Surgical injuries
- Death
What kind of damages may I be entitled to?
Depending on the severity of your case, your Surgical Error Lawyer in Maryland from Greenberg Law Offices can tell you whether you are eligible for the following monetary damages:
- To cover pain and suffering
- To reimburse any medical costs and insurance bills
- To compensate for lost wages and your lost capacity to work
- Funeral costs, if you are filing a personal injury claim on behalf of a family member
Common Forms of Surgical Malpractice
A surgical error is not automatically considered malpractice. In order to constitute malpractice, the error must cause harm to the patient and result from a deviation from the accepted standard of care. In other words, the negligent conduct must fall short of what a reasonably competent surgeon would do under similar circumstances.
It is not only the surgeon that may commit medical malpractice. The surgeon is assisted by a whole team that includes nurses, anesthesiologists, and sometimes assistant surgeons. If any member of the surgical team commits an error that falls below the standard of care and the patient is harmed as a result, the team member may be liable for surgical malpractice. Fortunately, surgical errors are relatively rare. When they do occur, however, they often take one of the following forms:
Damage To Other Bodily Structures
A surgeon performing an operation on a diseased or injured body part may accidentally damage an adjacent structure. Examples include the following:
- Internal organs
- Blood vessels
- Nerves
- Connective tissue
Instruments Left in the Body
Despite counts performed before and after every procedure, there are about 1,500 cases of surgical instruments being left inside the body every year. These foreign objects may include metal instruments, such as retractors, or sponges. Serious complications can result.
Postoperative Infections
There is always a risk of infection with surgery. However, if the surgery took place under unsanitary conditions or with improperly sterilized instruments, that is conduct that falls well below the accepted standard of care. If postoperative infection occurs thereafter, it may be grounds for a malpractice suit. If this sounds like something you are currently dealing with, then call a Lawyer for Surgical Errors in MD immediately.
Unnecessary Surgery
This can involve a procedure that is completely unnecessary or a surgery that is more extensive than the condition calls for. Sometimes unnecessary surgery is the result of an honest mistake by the surgeon, such as a misdiagnosis of the condition. Unfortunately, there have been instances of surgeons purposefully misleading patients into thinking that the surgery is necessary when it really isn’t.
These unscrupulous surgeons then perform unnecessary surgery on the patient in order to receive payment for it. This may go beyond ordinary negligence into criminal behavior, and swift action from a MD Surgical Error Lawyer from Greenberg Law Offices is strongly advised.
Wrong-Site Surgery
Sometimes the procedure is necessary but the surgeon mistakenly performs it in the wrong location. This can result in the amputation of uninjured limbs and the removal of healthy organs. Despite the implementation of Universal Protocol to prevent these errors, there are still thousands of cases of surgical malpractice that occur every year.
You do not have to navigate the challenges of a surgical error alone. Please consider scheduling a consultation with a Baltimore, Maryland surgical error lawyer from Greenberg Law Offices today in order to clarify your situation and learn about your legal options.
If you have recently been injured by a medical procedure, you may have the right to file a medical malpractice lawsuit and be compensated for your actions with help from a Surgical Error Lawyer in Baltimore, MD at Greenberg Law Offices. If you are in this situation, you probably have a lot of questions. The most common question that people in this situation have is, “How do I prove my case?” After all, if you cannot prove it, you cannot win your lawsuit.
You can rely on your Surgical Error Lawyer in Baltimore, Maryland to help prove your case, but it is beneficial to know how it works all the same. What it really boils down to is proving that your medical professional acted negligently.
Proving Negligence
So how does one prove that an action or lack of action was medical negligence? The legal definition of negligence has four components, which each must be proven independently. They are:
- Duty
- Breach
- Causation
- Damage
Duty of Care
As your Baltimore, MD Surgical Error Lawyer may tell you, duty is commonly called “standard of care.” All physicians, nurses, surgeons, and medical technicians are expected to meet a certain degree of care. The first step in a personal injury case would be proving that the doctor had an obligation to the patient to treat him or her with a level of care that is expected within the medical community.
Breach in Standard of Care
The second component of medical negligence is breach. This is simply proving that the medical professional failed to meet the standard of care that all physicians are held to. It may seem like proving that your healthcare provider failed to meet the standard of care would already be enough to win the case, but there is more to it. There are two other components that still need to be proven, which is why we strongly advise getting help from your MD Surgical Error Lawyer in Baltimore.
Causation
Causation refers to whether or not the breach of the standard of care caused your injuries. A medical professional is not guilty of medical malpractice unless their failure caused an injury. The final component of medical negligence refers to the damage you have suffered. The damage needs to be proven as real and significant. If the injury is too minor, it may not be enough to warrant a lawsuit.
In Summary
To recap, proving that your medical professional committed medical malpractice against you involves proving that he or she failed to meet the standard of care expected from every medical professional, and this failure caused real and significant damage to you. As you can tell, this is a complicated and elaborate process, which is why you should leave it up to your Maryland Surgical Error Lawyer at Greenberg Law Offices for guidance.
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