Medical Malpractice Lawsuits

Attorneys are required to fulfill a fiduciary responsibility to their clients and they must act with a degree of diligence, skill and care. However, just like any other professional, attorneys make mistakes.

The mistakes made by an attorney are malpractice. To prove negligence in a legal sense the aggrieved party must prove duty, breach of duty, causation and damages. Let's look at each one of these aspects.

Duty

Medical professionals and doctors swear to apply their education and skills to cure patients and not to cause further harm. Duty of care is the basis for patients' right to compensation for injuries caused by medical malpractice. Your lawyer can assist you determine if the actions of your doctor violated this duty of care, and whether those breaches caused injuries or illness to you.

To prove a duty of care, your lawyer must to establish that a medical professional had an official relationship with you in which they had a fiduciary obligation to exercise reasonable expertise and care. This can be demonstrated by eyewitness testimony, physician-patient reports and expert testimony from doctors who have similar education, experience, and training.

Your lawyer must also prove that the medical professional violated their duty of care by not adhering to the accepted standards of practice in their area of expertise. This is often called negligence. Your lawyer will assess the conduct of the defendant to what a reasonable individual would perform in the same situation.

In addition, your lawyer must show that the defendant's breach of duty directly led to injury or loss to you. This is known as causation. Your attorney will rely on evidence like your doctor-patient records, witness statements and expert testimony to demonstrate that the defendant's failure to live up to the standards of care in your case was the direct cause of your loss or injury.

Breach

A doctor is required to perform a duty of care to his patients that corresponds to professional medical standards. If a doctor does not meet these standards and this causes injury, then medical malpractice or negligence could occur. Expert testimony from medical professionals who possess similar qualifications, training as well as experience and qualifications can help determine the quality of care for a specific situation. Federal and state laws, along with policies of the institute, help define what doctors are required to do for certain types of patients.

To prevail in a malpractice lawsuit it must be proven that the doctor violated his or his duty of care and malpractice lawsuits that this breach was a direct cause of an injury. In legal terms, this is referred to as the causation factor and it is vital that it is established. For instance when a broken arm requires an xray, the doctor has to properly fix the arm and place it in a cast for proper healing. If the doctor failed to complete the procedure and the patient was left with an irreparable loss of function of that arm, then malpractice law firms could have occurred.

Causation

Attorney malpractice claims are based on evidence that the attorney's errors resulted in financial losses for the client. For example when a lawyer does not file an action within the timeframe of limitations, leading to the case being lost for ever the party who suffered damages could bring legal malpractice lawsuits.

It is crucial to be aware that not all mistakes made by attorneys are malpractice. Strategy and planning errors aren't usually considered to be a sign of negligence. Attorneys have a broad choice of discretion when it comes to making decisions, as long as they're in the right place.

Additionally, the law grants attorneys considerable leeway to fail to conduct discovery on the behalf of their clients, as long as the action was not unreasonable or negligent. The failure to discover crucial information or documents like medical reports or statements of witnesses could be a sign of legal malpractice. Other examples of malpractice are a failure to add certain defendants or claims such as omitting to file a survival count in a wrongful-death case or the frequent and long-running failure to communicate with clients.

It is also important to remember that it must be proven that but the negligence of the lawyer the plaintiff would have won the case. Otherwise, the plaintiff's claim for malpractice will be rejected. This requirement makes the process of bringing legal malpractice lawsuits difficult. It is essential to choose an experienced attorney.

Damages

To win a legal malpractice lawsuit, the plaintiff must prove actual financial losses resulting from the actions of the attorney. In a lawsuit, this needs to be demonstrated using evidence, such as expert testimony and correspondence between the attorney and the client. In addition the plaintiff must demonstrate that a reasonable lawyer would have avoided the damage caused by the negligence of the attorney. This is referred to as proximate cause.

It can happen in many different ways. Some of the most common mistakes are: failing to meet an expiration date or statute of limitations; failing to perform an investigation into a conflict in an issue; applying the law in a way that is not appropriate to the client's specific circumstances; and violating the fiduciary obligation (i.e. the commingling of trust account funds with attorney's personal accounts) or a mishandling of an instance, and not communicating with the client.

Medical malpractice lawsuits typically include claims for compensatory damages. These damages compensate the victim for out-of pocket expenses and losses, such as medical and hospitals bills, costs of equipment to aid in recovery, and lost wages. Victims are also able to claim non-economic damages, such as pain and discomfort, loss of enjoyment of their lives, and emotional anxiety.

In many legal malpractice cases there are claims for punitive and compensatory damages. The former compensates a victim for losses resulting from the negligence of the attorney, whereas the latter is designed to deter any future malpractice committed by the defendant.