Medical malpractice occurs when a medical professional such as a doctor, nurse, anesthetic, or other such healthcare gives cause on injury or death, administers inappropriate treatment, gives substandard treatment, or omits to take a necessary measure to a patient.
Medical malpractice usually involves an error in the medical procedure. It could be in a diagnosis, medication dosage, treatment regimen, health management, or aftercare.
NJ hospital malpractice attorney can make it possible for clients to get compensation for any ill-treatment received from sub-standard healthcare.
Understanding medical malpractice
When a patient seeks medical assistance, the least one expects is to be given an acceptable standard of healthcare. The healthcare giver is not entirely liable for all the harm a patient may experience. However, the medical professional is legally bound if their client experiences injury or harm, inflicted by the healthcare giver is proven to have deviated from the standard care expected in similar conditions and situations.
Factors that define medical malpractice
- Failure to provide the acceptable healthcare standard: healthcare professionals are required by law to offer medical assistance within certain standards. If they fail to adhere to them, they potentially face a case of negligence.
- Harm or injury from negligence: usually, a patient who feels the provider was negligent, but no harm or injury happened may have no claim to raise. Additionally, a patient must prove that the negligence of the professional is behind their injury or harm. They must show beyond any reasonable doubt that had the negligence not happened,the present condition would have been different.
- The injury incurred must have serious consequences: the patient must prove that the harm or injury inflicted by the healthcare professional brought them devastating damage.
The devastating damage could be:
- Suffering
- Unending pain
- An enduring lifelong hardship
- The potential loss of income
- A disability
However, patients should know that a treatment that has a dissatisfactory outcome is not interpreted as malpractice. Malpractice happens only when the healthcare giver inflicts injury, harm as a result of their negligence.
There are several cases where negligence can lead to a viable lawsuit. They include
- Disregarding a patient’s medical history
- Failure to diagnose an existing condition
- An inappropriate or unnecessary surgical procedure
- Premature discharge from a healthcare facility
- Lack of proper follow-up
- Failure to request appropriate tests
- Failure to act on laboratory tests
- Prescribing an inappropriate dosage
- Prescribing the wrong medication
- Leaving surgical tools and other items inside a patient’s body
- Operating on the wrong part of the patient’s body
- Persistent pain after a surgical procedure
- Developing fatal infections contracted from a hospital
- Developing bedsores and pressure ulcers on patient’s body
- Fire incidences in the hospital facility
- Patient committing suicide while in the care of the healthcare
