NY Medical Malpractice Lawyer - When Doctors Fail

New York City Medical Malpractice Lawyer - Examining the legal consequences for medical professionals. NY Medical Malpractice Lawyer

New York City Medical Malpractice Lawyer News - Examining the legal consequences for medical professionals when a serious patient health problem goes undiagnosed for too long.

 

From health care reform measures designed to make treatment costs more affordable for patients to controversial medical innovations, many facets of health care in the United States have long been major topics of debate. Because health care facilities in the country are largely owned and run by private sector businesses, some have suggested a number of industry decisions are based more on desired financial outcomes than what is in the best interest of patients in terms of their health.

 

In heated discussions about the healthcare industry, the issue of medical malpractice that may stem from the effort to reduce costs is frequently brought up. Statistics show that medical malpractice is among the top five leading causes of death in the country, resulting in an estimated 225,000 lives lost each year. In a number of the cases, a failure to diagnose a serious condition or delayed diagnoses was a factor.

 

In 2013, the Huffington Post published a report on the most common reasons patients bring forth medical malpractice claims against their doctors. According to a study presented in the report, not only are delayed or failed diagnoses the leading basis of such lawsuits in the United States, the same can be said for claims filed in other parts of the world as well.

 

Source: Huffington Post Report “Top Reason Patients Sue Doctors: Failure To Diagnose”

 

“The study -- which reviewed information on medical malpractice claims against primary care doctors in the United States, Australia, France and Canada -- found that between 26 and 63 percent of claims were related to missed diagnoses.”

 

To read more visit http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/19/reason-patients-sue-doctors-delay-failure_n_3623509.html.

 

A number of healthcare reform advocates suggest that filing malpractice claims is a major step to helping improve conditions in healthcare industry settings. Such claims act as a deterrence to repeating risky actions, and ensure that health care professionals are held accountable for negligent acts that harm patients. Dr. David Troxel, who was at the time the medical director at The Doctors Company, is stated by the Huffington Post to also point out that an examination of such claims “can help doctors identify situations that may result in adverse events for patients, as well as systems that can be put into place to help prevent errors from happening.”

 

Troxel is quoted as stating, “Ultimately [the process of analyzing malpractice claims] can contribute to improving the quality of medical practice” because the information found from the reviews can be relayed to other physicians.

 

Recently, the New York Law Journal released a report on major verdicts and settlements of personal injury cases last year. Among the highest verdicts involved the case of a patient who suffered a collapsed lung that was not addressed in a timely manner. As noted in the report, the patient, a 16-year-old teenager who was being treated at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York, reportedly suffered severe brain damage due to the issue. A jury found there was a departure from the accepted standard of medical care in the case and awarded a verdict of $22,977,200.

 

The case was handled by New York based medical malpractice attorney Jonathan C. Reiter of the Jonathan C. Reiter Law Firm, PLLC who says that such cases, “help patients when there is a major oversight that leaves them with long term debilitating health challenges and also challenges hospitals to implement better protocols so that negligence can be minimized.”

 

In an effort to prevent the filing of malpractice claims, some hospitals have implemented preventative measures to improve conditions for patients. For example a survey developed by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) has been used by hundreds of hospitals to measure safety using self evaluation techniques. Time will tell however, whether such measures will help change the landscape overall and reduce preventable injuries caused by medical malpractice in the United States.

 

Media Contact:

Jonathan C. Reiter Law Firm, PLLC Manhattan Medical Malpractice Lawyer

646-863-8172

 

http://injuryaccidentnews.jcreiterlaw.com/

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