Each day, patients go and see a doctor because they’re not feeling well yet fail to get the answers that they’re looking for. Others will go into the hospital to have a surgical procedure performed on them yet come out feeling worse than they originally did or even end up dead. We all expect our doctors to find a way to make us feel better, yet in those instances in which this doesn’t occur, many of us wonder why this is the case.
A review of medical malpractice lawsuits by the liability insurance company Ultra Risk Advisors reveals some reasons why doctors get sued for poor patient outcomes. Providing incorrect or delayed diagnosis is one of those reasons.
Their research shows that doctors who fail to communicate with their patients about why certain tests are being ordered and what the course of action that they’ll take after they’ve come in get sued often. If they fail to tell their patients how long it will take for results to come in or delay in calling them to tell them what they were, they get sued as well.The insurer found that missed diagnoses are a big problem too. Most of these stemmed from doctors not taking the time to truly listen to their patients as they talked about their symptoms or answering questions they had.Their research shows that lawsuits filed for these reasons are completely preventable. They found that a doctor listening more to the patient and their family members goes a long way in preventing them from filing a malpractice lawsuit if a negative outcome occurs.
Two other common reasons medical malpractice lawsuits were filed was because doctors failed to get a patient’s informed consent before performing a certain procedure or made inaccurate notations in their records.
All doctors and their professional medical staff are required to uphold a bare minimum standard of care when dealing with patients. Determining whether a doctor or a nurse upheld their responsibilities in treating you is not easy for just anyone to determine but may be abundantly clear to a specialist in the field.
If you’ve been hurt at the hands of a doctor, then you’ll want to consult with a New Haven medical malpractice attorney who has doctors at their disposal that can determine if errors indeed occurred.