People may have a bad medical experience, but that may not be medical malpractice. Find out what medical malpractice is before talking to an Atlanta personal injury lawyer.
Did you know that there are not that many suspected med mal cases that actually make it to court? This is largely due to the fact that many patients don’t really know exactly what goes into making a med mal case versus what general complications of a medical procedure happen to be. In other words, they don’t know what really constitutes medical malpractice and what constitutes a general and likely expected complication of a certain treatment, procedure or surgery.
Knowing what the basics of a med mal claim are before you try to file one is a good idea, largely so you don’t waste time pursuing a case that isn’t a case. The first thing you need to know is that when it comes to figuring out if there is medical malpractice afoot is whether negligence was involved in your injury. You need to be able to show that the doctors or other medical professionals in charge of your care were negligent in their duties to you and because they were, they caused you harm.
The negligence we’re talking about here may come in many forms. The most glaringly evident one would be if a surgeon left a sponge inside your body after an operation. A far more subtle one would deal with misdiagnosis of cancer. In the case of a doctor leaving something in your body, you have a fairly solid case to work with, because there is plenty of evidence that shows the instrument or object inside your body. It is evidence like this that an Atlanta personal injury lawyer would use in court while representing a medical malpractice plaintiff.
On the other hand, misdiagnosis or failure to diagnose is a different can of worms. These are difficult cases to prov because the field of medicine is fraught with all kinds of what ifs, alternatives, diseases that mimic something else and human error. For a misdiagnosis, you need precise and very clear evidence that the medical professional didn’t recognize the signs of your condition and also failed to do something about it or failed to implement the proper or right treatment/medication(s) to deal with the issue. In cases like that, you will need an expert medical witness who combs through your medical history in depth and who will testify for you in court.
One thing you need to remember is that if the jury finds that a doctor did everything they possibly could to provide the absolute best outcome for your treatment or procedure, they will often find for the defense, even if your condition is not fixed. This is why you really need to speak to a skilled and competent Atlanta personal injury lawyer about your case. If however, there is obviously gross negligence in the handling of your case, this is another story altogether.
Robert Webb is an Atlanta personal injury lawyer with Webb & D’Orazio, a law firm specializing in Atlanta personal injury, malpractice, criminal defense, and business law. Learn more at Webbdorazio.com.
