Houston Medical Malpractice Attorneys

Typically, when people think of medical malpractice, they think of terrifying and catastrophic hospital stories. However, under the defined conditions, medical malpractice claims are broader than they appear. As stated, a plaintiff can file a medical malpractice claim whenever a medical facility or health care professional fails to meet the expected standards of treatment. For example, malpractice can be as simple as a doctor using latex gloves with a patient who is allergic to the material, causing them to suffer a severe allergic reaction. Medical malpractice lawsuits must prove four conditions for the plaintiff to recover damages.

The four conditions are as follows:

• In regards to duty, a medical malpractice lawsuit must prove that the defendant had an obligation to diagnose an ailment, perform a procedure, or care for the defendant’s well-being due to the duty the defendant had to the patient. For instance, a lawyer can prove duty through medical records that confirm that a doctor is the primary care physician for a patient. In the latex glove example, the doctor can be shown to have a duty to the patient based on the fact that they are the patient’s longtime dermatologist.
• Breach of duty is the defendant’s indirect failure to diagnose given symptoms or treat an ailment correctly. Essentially, a breach of duty is a defendant’s mistake that objectively flies in the face of the standard treatment procedure. In the latex glove example, the doctor using latex gloves despite the patient’s medical chart showing that they are allergic to the material would be considered a breach of duty.
• Harm is the physical or emotional consequences that the patient endured at the hands of the defendant. Physical harm should be proven through hard evidence, such as pictures of the wound that resulted from the malpractice, which can be presented to the jury. In the latex glove example, the allergic reaction could have caused the patient to suffer anaphylactic shock, resulting in a swollen tongue. The report the hospital creates that summarizes the episode of anaphylactic shock may be used to prove that harm occurred.
• The last element a lawyer must prove is causation. Causation is proof that the breach of duty by the defendant and the harm that the patient suffered have a cause-and-effect relationship. Causation must prove that the defendant’s negligence caused the plaintiff’s stated harm. In the latex glove example, the plaintiff’s team may gather testimonies from family members who witnessed the plaintiff suffer from past anaphylactic shock episodes due to latex contact. By collecting old testimonies where the plaintiff suffered anaphylactic shock, a lawyer can prove that there is a causal relationship in which the doctor’s breach of duty caused the patient’s harm.

There are three kinds of damages typically available through a medical malpractice lawsuit.

• General damages are compensation for unquantifiable losses, like mental anguish.
• Special damages are quantifiable economic losses, such as medical bills and lost time at work.
• Punitive damages are money awards specifically designed to punish criminally negligent or egregious healthcare providers to compel them to change; these damages are rare.

Misdiagnosis, surgical errors, or prescribing the wrong medication make up the bulk of medical malpractice cases. Misdiagnosis is the most common of the three. With misdiagnosis cases, your doctor may fail to identify your illness in a timely fashion or may identify the wrong illness. In either case, misdiagnosis could cost some people—especially cancer patients—years of their life, so it’s a serious act of negligence.