The media often boils stereotypical medical malpractice cases to the ones you see on the news, such as a surgeon leaving tools inside a patient. Or maybe an obstetrician messed up on a child, resulting in their death.
You have grounds if your loved one died from one of the 10 types of medical malpractice to earn the biggest settlement you can. The law must serve justice for cases like yours where a loved one died at the hands of a doctor or medical professional.
Bills you didn’t expect will continue to pile up along with child support, school loans, and other debts. Your financial health has drastically changed due to the accident and it will get worse if you do not seek legal assistance.
The Diagnosis
Doctors often make mistakes with patients at the very beginning before they have done any treatments or procedures. Diagnosing the victim with one medical condition and turning out to be a deadly ailment is a common scenario in wrongful death.
Along similar lines, healthcare professionals sometimes outright refuse to or are slow to name a patient’s condition, leading to their passing.
Misdiagnosis
Cancer and heart attack are two of the most popular conditions you’ll see medical professionals mess up on. Your loved one can have a doctor tell them they have a different condition like heartburn or bronchitis.
Then, they can suffer the ultimate consequences due to the doctor’s negligence. These misdiagnoses have greater consequences than non-life-threatening sicknesses since they lead to serious injury and then death.
Failure to diagnosis
One example of a failure to diagnosis is if a man had a ruptured shunt and bled to death in his living room. The dialysis center may have missed the growing infection and did not send him straight to the emergency room for immediate care.
Hospital and medical facility deaths like these could have been avoided if the doctors had been diligent during crucial checkups.
Delayed diagnosis
A dentist with a close relationship to a patient may not diagnosis oral cancer when he sees it, leading to an innocent death.
Even if they waited longer to ensure it was the correct condition, medical conduct and code of ethics would disagree. It is always best to exercise caution with potential health issues that could cause the end for a victim.
Treatment Errors
Medical treatments, whether over-the-counter or prescription, can produce deadly results in victims if the doctor is negligent or not careful. These can be some of the easiest cases to dismiss and miss out on serving justice to the responsible party.
You may be unsure if your loved one passed away from a certain medication or if there were other health factors involved. Also, it can be difficult to track all the medical practices that took place from various doctors.
An experienced medical malpractice lawyer will collect witness testimony and previous medical history and testing to prove whether that was the case or not.
Medication errors
CNBC reported that a 2-year-old girl lost her life when a pharmacy technician increased her normal dodge of sodium chloride by 20 times.
Whether by a doctor or a medical professional outside the hopsital, medication errors can kill loved ones both young and old.
Failure to treat
One way doctors fail to treat patients who inadvertently pass away are the elderly with compromised immune systems. They die at larger rates from infections and illnesses than average adults, which is why facilities should act quick.
Your family member or friend can die when they don’t and leave you and your relatives devastated.
Procedural Failure
Major surgeries and procedures involving someone’s life on the line are the most apt for death experiences. The media is bent on showcasing medical malpractice stories as prime examples of doctors and institutions screwing up.
What experienced wrongful death attorneys will tell you is that any case where a doctor did not perform their standards of care when they would in normal circumstances is worthy of a probate hearing.
However, procedural failures are some of the most tragic healthcare stories we hear as medical malpractice lawyers. That’s why we’re committed to delivering results with the medical malpractice claims we receive.
Surgical errors
Operating on the wrong patient, treating the wrong body part, or failing to instruct patients on after-surgery care are all examples of surgical errors. Not only does your loved one pay the ultimate price, but the hospital will leave you the bill.
Simple mistakes or negligence like unsanitariness are just as prone to creating surgical errors as slipping on the scalpel.
Both are valid wrongful death cases you should present in probate court.
Birth Death
While cerebral palsy can cause birth injuries and fetal distress, infants can also die at the hands of an obstetrician.
The doctor failing to perform a C-section can lead to oxygen deprivation and, if they don’t get the baby out quick enough, will kill them.
Medical product liability
A preventable form of medical malpractice deaths come from medical equipment malfunction, which is closely related to product liability in wrongful death. A manufacturer’s error in creating a product like a sleep apnea machine could create a nationwide recall if someone dies without intention.
Anesthesia errors
Patients are vulnerable when they go under sleepy gas and leaves room for weighty physician mistakes.
Anesthesia can have adverse effects on victims depending on the medication and their medical history. Doctors that dismiss these concerns and ignore vital signs can make your family member or friend sleep for good.
Bedsores
Finally, the last type of medical malpractice are bedsores that afflict the elderly in droves. Their lives end sooner than expected due to the negligence of hospitals and nursing homes.
They can miss bedsore symptoms early on, which can develop into conditions leading to death.
Conclusion
We recommend filing a malpractice suit with an experienced wrongful death lawyer if your loved one died from 1 of these medical malpractice types. It is unfair for your family to lose a precious relationship you hold dear.
And it doesn’t fall in your responsibility to pay for funeral costs and medical bills due to a doctor or hospital’s negligence in duties of care.
Michael Strickland, Ed Kendall, and his team of results-driven attorneys are ready to hear about your loved one’s death. They can let you know if there’s a potential case and explain the steps for moving forward with it in probate.
Our team cares about seeing your family recover from this traumatic death and is committed to fighting for you in court.
Give our Alabama, Washington DC, Georgia, or Vermont offices a call at (334).269.3230. We’d be happy to speak with you over a free consultation call or in-person visit.