Articles Posted in Medical malpractice

Medical malpractice | February 7, 2017

Doctors prescribe medications in the hope of saving or improving lives. Tragically, medications can lead to serious medical issues or even death. In some cases, it is due to a doctor prescribing the wrong medication or a nurse administering the wrong dose. In others, it can be due to problems with labeling or with the way the drug was made or handled. Sometimes, insurance issue contribute to medication injuries. A pharmacist may substitute a different drug in a similar class or group in order to bill your insurance, causing a dangerous interaction. For some unfortunate people, their drug-related injury is the result of a mixture of medications that had a profoundly negative impact on their health.

Drug interactions occur when medications taken by a patient simultaneously create negative side effects or serious injury, possibly including death. Often, these injurious and deadly drug interactions happen because of medical malpractice or neglect. If you believe you have suffered an injury due to a serious drug interaction, you should speak with a personal injury or medical malpractice attorney as soon as possible.

Medical malpractice | January 26, 2017

In recent years, there’s been a push toward mediation over litigation in just about every area of civil law — and medical malpractice is no exception.

Advocates of mediation over litigation for medical malpractice say that it promotes communication and can change the perspectives of everyone involved. They argue that the results can be beneficial in ways that go beyond financial compensation, allowing families to gain more closure and encouraging hospitals and doctors to revise practices or implement new procedures that will prevent similar tragedies.

Medical malpractice | January 20, 2017

There’s a lot of negative political press these days about medical malpractice claims suggesting that juries are just handing out ridiculously high settlements. Do these arguments have merit?

According to several decades of studies on the subject: no. Doctors are sympathetic defendants and tend to win three out of every four cases at trial. Even when a large award is given, the odds are good that the huge verdict that gets splashed across the papers will get whittled down during the appeals process and eventually settle for a much smaller sum.

Medical malpractice | December 23, 2016

Nursing home abuses can stay hidden for years — often coming to light only when something serious happens to a resident who has family members who won’t let the case rest or a conscientious employee finally has enough and steps forward.

For example, two former social workers at a Chicago facility have recently come forward with allegations that they were both fired when they refused to go along with instructions to fabricate medical records in order to hide signs of patient abuse.

Medical malpractice | November 23, 2016

It shouldn’t have been hard to figure out that there was something seriously wrong with the 50-year-old man who presented in Winfield’s Central DuPage Hospital one night back in 2012. He was suffering from a headache, neck pain, vomiting, and disorientation.

While it’s unclear what exact diagnosis the doctors at the hospital gave him, they only prescribed pain medication and sent him on his way. Had they done a simple CT scan and asked a neurologist to weigh in, the hospital would have likely discovered that the source of his pain and symptoms was a devastating brain bleed that led to a stroke two days later.

Medical malpractice | October 20, 2016

A recent study has determined that the quality of outpatient care in the United States has generally not improved over the past 10 years. A growing awareness of the frequency of medical mistakes has led to numerous programs designed to improve patient safety and outcomes. These efforts have not produced appreciable results, according to survey data analyzed by the study’s authors. The quality of American medical treatment is not getting better.

Two Ways Medical Care Falls Short

Medical malpractice | October 6, 2016

College sports teams travel all around the country for events. The issue with this is that there isn’t any legal clarification that provides protections for team doctors who are traveling with the team. A recent bill passed the United States House of Representatives that would clarify that the medical malpractice insurance team doctors carry would follow them in other states.

The Sports Medicine Licensure Clarity Act would strip away the jurisdictional limitations that many malpractice insurance carriers claim apply when the practitioner is in another state. The bill is backed by the American Medical Society for Sports Medicine. Those who support the bill note that the current state of medical malpractice insurance for the team medical staff leaves the staff members at an undue financial and professional risk if there is something that happens while the team is traveling.

Medical malpractice | August 11, 2016

Medical malpractice comes in many forms, as all it takes is negligence for a doctor to breach the duty of care that is owed to you as a patient. That said, there are trends with this issue, and many cases fall into a few broad categories. Below are five of the main types of medical malpractice in Illinois. If you believe you were a victim of medical malpractice, contact our Chicago medical malpractice lawyers at Seidman, Margulis & Fairman, LLP today.

• Failure to diagnose or a misdiagnosis. These cases are especially dire when the mistake means that treatment on a progressive illness — like cancer — is not started as quickly as it should be.

Medical malpractice | July 18, 2016

People make mistakes when they get tired. Fatigue is a known safety hazard in many industries. One of the reasons for establishing the 40-hour work week was to cut down on the number of fatal workplace accidents. The Fair Labor Standards Act codified this limitation on working hours in 1938 as part of Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal. The FLSA was a step forward for workers, but not every job was included in its protections. Salaried employees and professionals do not qualify for overtime pay and are often expected to work more than 40 hours in a week. In fact, according to a Gallup survey, the average work week for full-time employees is 47 hours. For medical residents, 40 hours is an unusually long shift.

Fatigue Affects Everyone

Medical malpractice | June 14, 2016

Sometimes, it feels like doctors don’t want you to give them any more details. They just ask you questions that can be answered with a simple yes or no, when you really want to talk about how something happened or why it happened. Below are some tips to break through and provide more information.

— Don’t let the doctor control the conversation. The doctor may interrupt you when you try to keep going with your answer, and many people then fall silent, thinking the doctor is in charge. This isn’t true. You’re equals in this setting. Push on and provide the information you want to provide.