What Are The Chances of Medical Malpractice

Medical malpractice is actually very rare in the healthcare industry. According to John H. Fischer, the chances of medical malpractice are actually about 1 in 100. That is actually extremely high!

Think about it. 

Every day, there are more than 100 patients being served in a doctor’s office. It is possible that one patient every day is misdiagnosed, mistreated, etc. 

Obviously, I’m slightly exaggerating the claim. But I’m also advising you to be careful. If 1 out of 100 patients will be a victim of medical malpractice, that is still a significant chance.  

If we calculate this with the American population, it kills about 250,000 people throughout the year. This is only 3rd in causes of death to cancer and heart disease. 

That is crazy! 

So if these numbers are so high why isn’t there more concern or more articles to stop this?

Well, people only file 3% of medical malpractice. So out of the 1/100 people, only 3% file medical malpractice. 

Does this mean that there are millions of people walking around with a broken body? Or maybe they are walking with a medical tool in their bodies? 

Nope. Not at all actually.

Most of the time, the mistake is small or the patient doesn’t really notice the misdiagnosis. So they are either healed through time or since the mistake was small, it just goes unnoticed. 

How To Establish Medical Malpractice

To be considered medical malpractice, the patient has to establish one of these three traits:

The first one is that the violation has to violate or basically not be enough to satisfy the standard of care. 

The second one, and the most important trait, is negligence. Without negligence, there can’t be a case of medical malpractice. Since it is possible to have an action not satisfy the standard of care, the negligent portion will prove that the healthcare professional had intentionally avoided the standard of care, instead of doing it by mistake. 

The third one is that the medical malpractice caused significant damage. If it is a small cut, or maybe over time the injury can be fixed, then the lawyer will probably NOT pursue the case. Proving a medical malpractice case is extremely difficult and can be costly. Bringing in lots of medical professionals and gathering evidence can be extremely difficult for you and your lawyer. Unless you have sufficient evidence for the negligence and the damages done to your body were absolutely horrible, then it may not be worth the pursuit for you and the lawyer. 

Common Types of Medical Malpractice

There are lots of examples of medical malpractice, but we tackle the most important ones.

Misdiagnosis

Misdiagnosis, or failing to properly diagnose the patient is a big chunk of medical malpractice cases.

According to Barron Brown, misdiagnosis is when the doctors say one thing, but it ends being something completely different.. For example, if you go to the doctor and they diagnose you with coronavirus, but it is actually just the flu, then the doctor has technically committed medical malpractice.

The consequences of misdiagnosis can be devastating. It can cause you to miss potential surgeries or treatment that can save you time and your own life.

However, there is a big variable.

You must be also able to prove that the doctor was working negligently and was not actually serving you to their fullest. 

One way to prove this is to see what the doctor did and then comparing that to a competent doctor and see how they would have gone through with the diagnosis.

Unnecessary Surgery or Mistakes During Surgery

Although it sounds crazy, making an error during is something that happens. A botched surgery is not common, but it could be time consuming and have severe consequences. According to Johns Hopkins University, there are 4000 surgical errors.

Here is an example. A doctor was amputating the leg of a patient, but instead the doctor ended up amputating the wrong leg.
As stated prior, these cases aren’t common, but it happens. Puncturing a nearby organ, operating on the wrong body part, and leaving medical tools in the surgeon’s body. These are all considered mistakes and possible malpractice depending on how negligent and careless the healthcare professional was. 

Improper Medication

Most of the times when you go to the doctor, you don’t require surgery or anything too severe. Medication can fix a good percentage of people’s problems. Unless you suffered something that broke your body or damaged your internal organs severely, surgery is quite rare.

But, lots of medications can be misdiagnosed. The doctor could give the wrong medication or also forget that the patient is allergic to certain medications.. This can lead to a delayed healing process or something even worse, like death. 

Another common case of improper medication is harmful dosage. 

Dosage refers to the amount of medication the patient will be taking. 

Sometimes, the doctor can misdiagnose the dosage and either give too little (which will do almost nothing to help the patient) or too much (which may stress and tax the patient’s body, which could lead to more problems). 

What Do I Do For Medical Malpractice?

If you feel like you are a victim of medical malpractice, then you need to take action now.

You might be paying for medical bills and medication that is not actually helping or possibly even making you take steps backwards. 

If you’re still in pain and suffering and not getting any better, or maybe the doctor’s visit actually made you worse, give my team a call. 

We are always on standby and ready to help anyone with their case. Medical malpractice can cause serious harm to your body and you definitely don’t want to be paying for the negligence of someone else.