Malpractice In Hospitals

A Unique Perspective

In mid-December of 2023, I was diagnosed with leukemia--a cancer of the blood which causes a spectacular proliferation of white blood cells.  So many, in fact, that my blood became unable to carry sufficient oxygen, and became a "sludge" of white blood cells crowding out other blood components.  I had been short of breath for a couple of weeks, thought I may have had the flu or covid.

The most basic duty that any doctor has is to listen and pay attention to you.  If they don't listen, and don't take the time to perform a thorough examination, they will never get the information they need to actually help you.  A doctor who doesn't listen to your symptoms of chest pain isn't going to try to find out what is causing your chest pain.  A doctor who doesn't examine your child carefully is going to miss symptoms of meningitis.  A nurse who rushes through getting your information in an emergency department isn't going to write down what needs to go into your records.  And then

In analyzing whether you have a good medical malpractice case, we’ll look at three issues:

1. Did the Doctor Make an Inexcusable Mistake?

It is not enough in a medical malpractice case to prove that a doctor made a mistake. Some mistakes are excusable and are not medical malpractice.

For example, during a surgery, a doctor may accidentally cut something he didn’t intend to cut. This is probably medical malpractice, but in some cases may be an excusable mistake, and therefore not medical malpractice.

One of the most consistent goals of so-called “tort reform” is to put an upper limit on the amount that a defendant has to pay for the damage he causes in injury suits.  For example, in Texas, where there are such limits, a doctor can kill a child or a housewife or a grandfather through malpractice and only have to pay a maximum of $250,000 for doing so—no matter how bad the negligence.  That’s it:  the value placed on human life is $250,000.

Wrongful Death Lawsuits

At my firm we handle a variety of Wrongful Death lawsuits.  Because we work on so many medical malpractice cases, most of the Wrongful Death suits we handle are also medical malpractice cases. 

Just yesterday, I had a client call us about a medical malpractice case, but she wanted to know if we also handle Wrongful Death cases.  Since many people have asked this question over the years, I thought now would be a good time to talk about what a Wrongful Death case is.