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(516) 394-4200
Going to the doctor is hardly ever an enjoyable experience, whether you are just getting a regular checkup or seeking emergency care for a serious medical issue. No matter what, though, you have a right to expect that every medical professional involved in your care—primary care physicians, nurses, and specialists alike—will act compassionately and skillfully while providing that care. If a healthcare provider causes a patient to suffer significant physical harm by failing to fulfill this obligation, they may have committed what is known legally as malpractice.
In some ways, medical malpractice is very similar to the kind of traditional negligence you might be able to sue over in the wake of a traffic collision or an accidental fall. In other ways, though, malpractice is defined differently in purely legal terms and produces different outcomes in practice during actual cases. Fortunately, navigating those unique elements of this type of case and understanding exactly what malpractice is under the law is something our team of seasoned attorneys can provide vital assistance with.
According to a study published in The BMJ, medical malpractice is the third leading cause of death in the United States, with 250,000 annual fatalities, or nearly 700 each day. Wrongful death claims are more common than strokes, respiratory disease, and accidents. It trails only heart disease and cancer, causing countless damages and injuries. Another report in The Journal of Patient Safety puts the medical malpractice death number at 440,000. Either way, it’s far too many treatment errors and risks taken for something that should happen rarely if at all.
Medical malpractice, medical error, or medical negligence. No matter what you call it, it’s a far too frequent occurrence, and it can have tragic consequences such as wrongful death. Serious and long-lasting or permanent injury, chronic pain, suffering, and even death from misdiagnosis.
Medical malpractice can occur at any stage of your interaction with a doctor, medical professional, hospital, nursing staff or healthcare practitioner. It can happen during diagnosis, patient transfer, surgery, treatment, after care, or health management. At its most basic, malpractice is the failure of a healthcare professional, such as a doctor with malpractice insurance, to provide proper service through either ignorance, negligence, or criminal intent. It can include a wide range of scenarios: wrongful death, birth injuries, heart attack misdiagnosis, surgical errors, misdiagnosis, failure to consider allergies, prescription errors, and other damages and injuries. So-called “never events” include surgery on the wrong person, surgery on the wrong body part, and leaving a surgical instrument inside a patient.
Medical malpractice is essentially a mistake or negligence of some sort on the part of a doctor or other healthcare practitioner. While certainly not the norm – the vast majority of doctors and other healthcare professionals are competent and able individuals – medical malpractice in the United States does happen to patients more than we like to admit.
There was $3,891,743,050 in medical malpractice payouts in 2014. Nearly four billion dollars. New York State paid out $713,890,000 – just over $36 per capita – both of which were the highest in the country. The malpractice lawsuits that year primarily involved mistakes in diagnosis (33%), surgery (24%), treatment (19%), or obstetrics (11%). Sadly, a full 30% had death as the outcome of the error. (Source: National Practitioner Data Bank).
In order to bring a successful medical malpractice suit, there are essentially three criteria that must be met:
In most cases, patients have a statute of limitations of two years and six months to file a malpractice suit in the state of New York.
A monetary award from a malpractice lawsuit from misdiagnosis or or negligent doctors may be either compensatory damages – death, missed wages, hospital bills, future treatments, pain, personal injury and suffering – and/or punitive damages – designed to punish the guilty party in especially egregious cases.
Most licensed physicians have some kind of malpractice insurance coverage, which means most malpractice lawsuits center around negotiations with insurance providers either in private or in a public civil courtroom. Either way, you will be expected to meet certain procedural requirements when you initially file a malpractice complaint against a New York State doctor. Otherwise, the insurance companies will likely refuse to negotiate a settlement with you, and your case will likely be dismissed as soon as it reaches a judge’s desk.
The basic criteria for a malpractice claim are: existence of a standard of care, proof of a breach, causation of specific injuries and losses. With a typical personal injury lawsuit, you can legally make the case all on your own—or, ideally, with help from a seasoned legal professional—that one person’s negligence was the main and direct cause of your injuries.
You cannot do that with a medical malpractice claim, though, because the standard of care for doctors is based on what other equally qualified doctors would do, not what would be expected of any average person. What the standard of care would be for a doctor under specific circumstances, and what would qualify as a violation of that duty, is not something the average person would know. New York state law requires you to have formal support for your claim from at least one qualified medical expert.
New York Civil Practice Law & Rules § 3012-a requires lawyers for malpractice plaintiffs to file a certificate of merit either alongside their initial complaint or within 90 days of filing that complaint. This certificate must be in writing, and it generally must state under oath that the lawyer reviewed their prospective case with at least one licensed physician who agrees there are reasonable grounds for you to file a malpractice lawsuit.
No one should have to suffer as a result of misdiagnosis, medical malpractice and negligence. These instances can and should be eliminated. When it does happen, you deserve and are entitled to financial compensation.
The malpractice attorneys, legal staff, and lawyers at Duffy & Duffy, PLLC are experienced, sympathetic, and ready to fight on your behalf. If you or someone you love has been the victim of a medical error, misdiagnosis, etc. contact us today. Speak with our trusted legal advisors to see if you have a case. Medical malpractice lawsuits can’t right the wrong, but it can help you deal with the consequences.
No. Our injury cases are handled on a contingent retainer. You pay nothing upfront, and we recover attorney’s fees only if your litigation is successful. We don’t bill by the hour. You don’t need to worry about running up a large attorney’s bill before you see any recovery for your injuries.
Yes. Our firm is dedicated to creating a strong relationship with our clients, beginning with keeping your information and consultation confidential.
Each case we encounter is carefully screened and evidence scrutinized to make sure the claim is meritorious and may be successful at trial. We will perform an investigation, and then our partners make a final decision on whether to take on a case.
