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How to File a Medical Malpractice Lawsuit

A patient who believes he has suffered losses due to an error by a doctor could file a medical negligence lawsuit. These cases differ from personal injury lawsuits because they use a specialized standard to determine negligence.

In the United States, claims of malpractice are handled by state trial courts. Each state has its own laws and procedures.

Duty of care

A doctor, surgeon or any other health professional is bound by a duty of care to their patients. This legal principle states that every health professional who treats you is required to follow accepted medical practices.

This medical standard of care is a legal metric to which any medical malpractice claim is evaluated. It is crucial to a successful case, since it lays out a specific way to allow the injured person and his or her attorney to establish negligence by proving that a health care professional did not adhere to the standard of care.

The proof of this standard of treatment often requires the help of a qualified medical expert witness. These experts are crucial in determining the standard of care applicable to the particular case and the extent to which defendants have violated the law.

It is also important to prove that the breach of duty directly led to your injury, illness, or death. In medical malpractice lawsuits damages could include hospital expenses and lost income, future earning capacity, suffering, pain and even punitive damage. Your lawyer must prove the exact amount of the damages, which could be more than your original medical expenses. This is easier in some cases than others. In certain instances this is more straightforward than in others.

Breach of duty

A doctor is bound by the duty of acting in accordance with medical standards of care when providing treatments or providing services. When a doctor violates that duty and suffers injury the patient is injured, the patient may seek compensation for malpractice.

Medical negligence can involve an array of actions, including mistakes in diagnosis, medication dosage and health management, treatment and post-treatment. A lawsuit is considered valid if the plaintiff can prove four legal elements. These are the following:

The first requirement is an established doctor-patient relationship. The physician has a duty to inform patients about any risks or complications that may be involved in the procedure. Failure to do this could cause the physician to be held accountable for mistakes, even though the procedure was carried out perfectly. For instance, if a doctor did not warn patients that a particular procedure had a 30-percent chance of losing limbs, the patient may not reasonably have consented to the procedure.

The second thing to be proved is a breach in the standard of care. To do this, the lawyer needs to have testimony from an expert witness to prove that the doctor deviated from the standard of care. It must also be proved that the breach of standard of care resulted in the patient's injuries.

It takes a long time to settle medical negligence claims in the court system. It involves a significant amount of doctor and attorney time, thorough review of documents, appointing experts and conducting research into the medical and legal literature. A doctor who is facing a malpractice lawsuit will have to pay hefty court fees, attorney's product and costs, and expenses for expert testimony.

Causation

All healthcare professionals, including doctors, nurses, and other healthcare providers, are human and make mistakes. If those errors rise to the level of medical malpractice, patients are afflicted with serious and life-threatening injuries. It requires the expertise of both lawyers and doctors to prove that a health provider has breached their of duty and thereby caused injury. A successful claim must demonstrate four legal elements: a doctor-patient relationship; the medical professional's duty to the patient; the breach by the doctor of this duty; and injury resulting from that breach.

The injury has to be proven to be caused by the doctor's deviance from the standard of medical care. The legal standard for this part is higher than the "beyond a reasonable doubt" required in criminal cases. The lawyer representing the plaintiff must convince jurors or the fact-finders that it is more than likely that the negligence of the doctor caused the injury.

A medical expert is often required early in the process to help establish all of these elements. According to Rhode Island law only doctors with sufficient education, training and experience in the area of the suspected malpractice are able to give expert testimony. This is the reason that choosing a medical expert who is competent is so crucial in a case of malpractice.

Damages

Medical malpractice lawsuits are designed to collect damages that include the future and past expenses due to an injury. These expenses might include hospital bills or doctor visits, suffering and pain, as well as lost wages. The jury will decide on the amount of damages awarded by examining the evidence.

During the trial the plaintiff or their attorney must prove four main legal elements: (1) a physician has a professional responsibility to them; (2) the doctor breached this duty by acting negligently; (3) the doctor's negligence caused injuries; and (4) the injury resulted in measurable damages. The performance of a doctor is not malpractice if you are dissatisfied with it. However there must be an injury. An expert witness can help to clarify whether a doctor deviated from the standard of care.

The legal process of a malpractice lawsuit can go on for years, and involve a significant amount of time spent in "discovery," which involves the exchange of documents and the statements made under oath by parties involved in the case. Although many cases are settled prior to reaching the courtrooms, a portion of these cases go all through to an appeal to a jury and a verdict.

In order to cut down on the cost of litigation, a few states have adopted a number of administrative and legislative actions, known collectively as tort reform measures to reduce liability for malpractice. Some states have also implemented alternative dispute resolution strategies including binding arbitration. The objective of these alternatives to civil litigation is to decrease costs of litigation and speed up handling of malpractice claims while eliminating overly generous juries and weeding out unnecessary medical malpractice attorney claims.