When a person goes to a doctor or hospital for a medical concern, they expect to leave in better shape than when they arrived. Most of the time that is exactly what happens. In some cases, however, individuals seeking medical care suffer an injury at the hands of the people who are supposed to help them get better.
When negligence or unreasonable errors cause these injuries, the injured patient or their representative can seek compensation for damages by filing a medical malpractice claim. The best course of action if an individual believes they or a loved one has suffered from malpractice is to seek medical malpractice help from a professional.
Prescription Medication Errors
Prescription medication errors happen when a patient is prescribed the wrong medication or the wrong dosage. This could make their illness worse or create additional problems. Patients who are not informed about the side effects of the medication could suffer injuries or experience further complications.
Other errors in medication administration could occur through a mistake by nursing staff in drug administration, when the pharmacy distributes prescribed medication, or even by the drug manufacturer of the medication.
Diagnosis Errors
Almost 12 million outpatients are misdiagnosed in the United States every year. Misdiagnoses often occur when symptoms are miscommunicated, misinterpreted, or attributed to a similar diagnosis.
An incorrect diagnosis results in unnecessary treatment that could potentially harm the patient. The correct treatment is delayed until a proper diagnosis is made, causing potential progression of the illness, which could make it more challenging to treat.
The top five most common misdiagnosed conditions include infections, heart attack, heart disease, tumors or masses, heart disease, and pulmonary embolism.
Surgical Errors
Errors throughout the surgical processes could prove to be quite dangerous. They can happen during pre-op, the surgery itself, or post-op. Errors from surgery can include a variety of situations, including operating on the wrong location, damaging a nerve, excessive bleeding, and leaving something behind in the body. These errors could result in infections, additional surgeries, lasting damage, and potential death. The most common surgical mistakes tend to occur in the gastrointestinal tract and spine.
Errors in anesthesia are also related to surgical errors. These can include administering too much or too little anesthesia, or the wrong kind of anesthesia resulting in an adverse reaction.
Child Birth Errors
Childbirth is a time when both the mother and baby are prone to suffer from mistakes by a variety of medical professionals. Although not everything that goes wrong during childbirth has grounds for a malpractice case, many instances could result in a medical malpractice case. These could include:
- Babies born prematurely
- Preeclampsia
- Gestational diabetes of the mother
- Abnormalities of the placenta (placental abruption or placenta previa)
- Vaginal bleeding that is excessive or unexplained
- Mother’s hemorrhage during pregnancy or labor
- Long labor that is excessive and causes injury to the mother, the baby, or both
- Surgical negligence during a cesarean section
- Negligence during the administration of anesthesia during a cesarean section
- Shoulder or nerve injury to the baby during labor or delivery
