Surgical Errors in Medical Malpractice

New York, NY – May 19, 2015 – Submit Press Release 123 –

Surgical errors are frighteningly common in the United States. When the error is serious, however, it is much easier to prove that medical malpractice has occurred.

Roughly 225,000 people in the United States will die every year because of some kind of medical malpractice. That means that medical malpractice is the third-leading cause of the death in the U.S., only after heart attacks and cancer.

Surgical errors happen with alarming frequency in the United States. A rare medical mistake is much more understandable; after all, doctors are human too. However, a study examined the number of surgical mistakes that happened from 1990 to 2010, and they found that 9,744 malpractice payments were tied to very serious surgical errors. A very serious malpractice claim includes:

• Left behind a foreign object
• Wrong surgery
• Wrong surgery site
• Wrong patient

Other potential surgical errors include: infection, damage to internal organs, and nerve damage.

Surgical Errors and Medical Malpractice

Surgical errors are preventable, and the only reason that they occurred is because the doctor or other medical professional made a mistake when giving care.

There are four elements that a plaintiff must prove in a medical malpractice case:

• The doctor or medical professional owed the patient a duty of care. This requirement is generally met if the doctor is operating on his or her own patient.
• The medical professional violated the duty of care. If the patient can prove that the doctor made a surgical error, then the doctor violated his or her duty of care to the patient.
• The patient suffered an injury that is more serious than what would have occurred if there were no surgical errors. Some minor injuries, like bruising or bleeding, may be a common side effect of a surgery. The injury should go beyond these simple injuries to be compensable.
• The injury was caused by the surgical error. The injury has to have a direct connection to the surgical error that occurred.

Serious surgical malpractice claims are much easier to prove than those that may be less serious, including medical misdiagnosis or performing unneeded surgery. It is much easier to argue that nerve damage, damage to internal organs, or infection was the result of something else other than malpractice. It is much more difficult to explain why a doctor performed the wrong surgery or performed surgery on the wrong patient.

Surgeries can have many complications, even without surgical errors, so when doctors make life-threatening errors, they should be accountable. If your or a loved one has been the victim of a surgical error, consider speaking with a medical malpractice attorney to discuss your legal options.

Sources:

http://www.hg.org/article.asp?id=26470

http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Medical+Malpractice

http://www.foxnews.com/health/2012/12/21/surgeons-making-thousands-errors-happening-with-alarming-frequency/

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