Hospitals across the country are dealing with increasing pressure to reduce costs and minimize the expense of potentially unnecessary testing. As a result, patients are dealing with the very real threat of erroneous diagnosis and improper treatment.
While most doctors and hospital staff work tirelessly to ensure their patients receive the best possible care, the hospital itself often functions to constrain their staff, and limit their ability to test and diagnose illness to the medical standard of care.
As a result, hospitals are facing more lawsuits due to patients suffering injury that should have been avoided. In the worst cases, wrongful death lawsuits may be brought by family members who have lost a loved one to an avoidable error in diagnosis, or failure to diagnose.
Medical Malpractice Lawsuits
Medical malpractice lawsuits are handled by the US Civil Court system, and offer patients a way to hold the hospital liable for damage resulting from negligent medical care.
In order to bring a medical malpractice claim, a medical malpractice attorney will need to hire an expert medical witness to investigate the case and determine if and how medical negligence occurred.
Additionally, the medical expert will need to show how the negligence directly contributed to the patient damages, and how it should have been avoided using the prescribed medical standard of care.
Filing Suit Against a Hospital
In order to bring a medical malpractice claim against a hospital, doctor, or other medical professional, the patient will need to retain an experienced medical malpractice trial attorney. These lawyers are a rare breed, and deal with some of the most complex cases in civil tort law.
Fortunately, most of these attorneys offer patients a free consultation where they can hear the case and offer legal advice. Additionally, the lawyers usually work on a contingency fee basis, meaning the patient or their family will not have to worry about paying to prosecute a lawsuit that can cost upwards of $100,000.
