What Are Common Examples of Medical Malpractice?

Some of the most common types of medical malpractice include missed or incorrect diagnoses, surgical mistakes, and medication errors. Any deviation from accepted medical standards can count as medical malpractice if it causes harm to a patient. 

Proving medical malpractice is a difficult task, so you should rely on a professional for legal aid. You can speak to a medical malpractice lawyer from Wettermark Keith for more information on common types of malpractice and how to file a medical malpractice lawsuit. 

What Counts as Medical Malpractice?

Medical malpractice is defined as negligence by a healthcare professional that involves a departure from accepted standards of medical care. In other words, medical malpractice is when a healthcare professional (e.g., doctor, nurse, dentist, hospital worker, etc.) neglects their training and causes injury. 

Not every injury from medical care counts as malpractice. Healthcare workers can make all the right decisions, and injuries can still happen. With medical malpractice, the specific cause of the injury must be a departure from accepted care standards. 

If you are unsure whether your physician violated medical standards, call our offices at Wettermark Keith, and we can assess your case. 

Most Common Examples of Medical Malpractice

Malpractice is more common than many people realize. About one in four doctors has faced a medical malpractice claim, with rates differing by specialty and area of medicine. Exact numbers are difficult to ascertain, but some studies estimate that medical errors result in more than 100,000 deaths annually in the US. 

Below are some of the most common examples of medical malpractice our attorneys at Wettermark Keith regularly encounter in our practice. 

Missed/Incorrect Diagnosis

Doctors are trained to recognize symptoms and diagnose conditions by interviewing patients, running lab tests, and gathering family medical histories. Negligent doctors might miss signs indicating a particular illness or diagnose the wrong condition.

A missed or wrong diagnosis can mask the real condition until it worsens. 

Surgical Mistakes

Surgical mistakes are an extremely common type of malpractice committed by surgeons and surgical technicians. The category of surgical errors includes things like causing damage to vital structures or violating basic surgical procedures.

One particularly prevalent surgical error is accidentally leaving surgical instruments or foreign objects inside a patient.  

Failure to Monitor

ERs and ICUs may have patients that require constant monitoring to assess their condition and intervene when emergency care is necessary. Negligent doctors and nursing staff can miss critical issues like drops in blood pressure, heart rate changes, oxygen deprivation, and machine alarms. 

Medication Errors

Medication errors are likely the single most common type of medical error, affecting an estimated 1.5 million people per year. Medication errors encompass both dispensing the wrong medication and providing wrong dosages.

Failing to note adverse reactions with other medications is another type of medication error that can rise to the level of malpractice. 

Birth Injuries

Birth injuries are a type of injury that happens during labor and delivery. They are often a result of medical negligence, such as incorrect delivery technique or failing to monitor a fetus in distress.

Birth injuries often result in lifelong medical complications, so birth injury claims can involve extremely large amounts of money. 

Administrative Failures

Hospitals and healthcare facilities must follow specific laws regarding staffing, patient accommodations, records storage, and data privacy. Sometimes, errors from this administrative side of medicine can cause injuries. 

For instance, hospital administration can be liable if they fail to staff the ER with sufficient personnel to treat patients. 

Lack of Informed Consent

All medical procedures carry some level of risk, and physicians have a duty to disclose both benefits and risks of treatment. If a patient is not properly informed of side effects and they are harmed, the patient may be able to file a medical malpractice lawsuit against the provider. 

Proving Medical Malpractice

There are four core elements in a medical malpractice claim you need to prove to successfully recover damages:

1. A doctor-patient relationship existed between you and the physician.
2. The physician violated accepted medical standards, via action or omission.
3. The action or omission caused or exacerbated your injuries.
4. You suffered actual financial and psychological losses.

The central challenge of medical malpractice is proving that the healthcare professional in question deviated from accepted standards of care when they caused your injuries. As such, expert witnesses are a powerful type of evidence in these cases. 

A similarly qualified expert can shed light on whether your physician fell short of accepted standards of care. Our team at Wettermark Keith is highly familiar with working with medical experts to accurately identify lapses in professional conduct. 

Wettermark Keith: Medical Malpractice Lawyers

If you have more questions about examples of medical malpractice or believe you have a case, contact the team at Wettermark Keith. Our injury lawyers can evaluate your case 100% free of charge. Call us today.