Top Medical Malpractice Attorneys Phoenix Arizona

A medical malpractice lawsuit is something that causes physicians as well as patients/victims stress and anxiety. Statistically most medical physicians will experience 1 or more malpractice suits over the course of their career. Coping with a malpractice trial can be an emotional ordeal for both the patient/victim as well as the Physician—and one that lasts for both parties.

Insider Monkey compiled a list of the top five causes of malpractice lawsuits brought against physicians derived from information from Medscape, the CDC and Prevention Magazine.

The highest five reasons for malpractice lawsuits were:

1. Failure to diagnose a patient’s medical condition. Approximately thirty one percent (31%) of medical doctors evaluated by Medscape concluded “failure to diagnose” was the cause of a malpractice lawsuit brought against them. Medical doctors as well as all healthcare professionals have a duty to adhere to professional guidelines for screening and diagnostic testing as well as understanding of when these protocols call for validation of their initial diagnoses.

2. 31% of medical physicians had been sued for injuring a patient during treatment, often resulting in death or disability.

3. Failure to properly take care of a patient’s health condition. This includes the occurrence of Iatrogenic infections or physician caused infections. Last year a medical study suggested Iatrogenic caused health issues may be a bigger problem than diseases like tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS and sepsis or systemic infection.

4. Poor medical records and documentation. Physicians are required to at least meet or surpass what is considered medically acceptable accurate and complete documentation of patient care that another “like” physician would document.

5. Medication errors, either given orally or intravenously statistically cause at least one death every day and injure approximately 1.3 million people each year in the United States. Medication errors come various different forms starting from the initial prescription, administration of the drug, dosage complications as well as other medication problems such as allergies to medication. The World Health Organization (WHO) recognizes medication errors are so prevalent that they have publicly stated what steps medical healthcare providers must do to reduce these medication errors. In a hopeful attempt reduce and prevent prescription medicine errors and their resultant adverse events worldwide.

The Second Most Common Reason For Medical Malpractice lawsuits is Surgery

Let’s face it, surgery tends to be risky for patients and poses a certain risk factor for medical physicians who perform these surgeries in terms of medical malpractice claims according to Coverys a medical liability insurance company.

The insurer investigated 5 years of closed medical malpractice lawsuits from 2014-2018 finding that surgery-related claims made up 25% of the cases. Amazingly, 32 % of malpractice claims during that same five-year period was diagnostic errors, sometimes called failure to diagnose, as the primary cause of liability claims against primary care physicians and accounted for the highest percentage of financial settlements made.

Every one of the stages of the surgical process, including previous healthcare care as well as the level of medical decision-making leads to surgery, as well as post-surgical care can lead to malpractice claims and financial settlements.

Here Are The Top Three Surgeries That Caused 50% Of All Malpractice Claims

• General surgery (22%),
• Orthopedic surgery (17%) and
• Neurosurgery (8%)

29% of the injuries from surgery were considered permanent and significant or worse whereas 9% caused patient death. 39% of closed malpractice claims claimed a lack of technical skill by the surgeon. While approximately twenty seven percent of surgical claims touted failure of clinical judgment and/or communication. Some of the other causations mentioned were: leaving a foreign body seven percent (7%), performing an unnecessary procedure four percent  (4%), performing surgery on the wrong side, the wrong site of the patient, on the wrong patient (3%) and a delay in surgery (3%).

Why is it so hard to prove medical malpractice in a court of law

So far we have discussed the most common types of medical malpractice but one must remember just because you think you have been a victim of medical malpractice there are many hoops one must jump through to actually prove that medical malpractice actually took place. For instance, it is almost impossible to prove that you got an infection after a surgery meaning you have to prove how and when you got the infection. Also as a matter of fact you have to sign a medical release that you are aware that you may in fact become or get an infection and if you do have a surgery and end up with an infection you can not claim you were aware you could get an infection just went out the window because you signed what is known as informed consent.

Consumer Beware: Medical Malpractice Is Considered One Of The Most Complex Sections Of Personal Injury Law.

One must understand that awful consequences from orthopedic surgical injuries can and do occur even in the absence of medical negligence on the surgeon’s part. Just the fact alone that this has been historically documented that bad or unacceptable surgical results were caused by a surgeon can be very difficult. For instance, did you know it is medically acceptable to cause a fracture during hip replacement. Obviously, the surgeon doesn’t try to cause a fracture but if a fracture is caused during the portion of hip replacement it is considered an acceptable risk.

Your health care provider bears no burden of proof in a medical malpractice claim.

In medical malpractice law the burden of proof lies with you the patient and it is very difficult to prove to a jury of your peers that a medical practitioner acted unreasonably. Medical Malpractice cases are very expensive because of this burden of proof.

At Tucker Miller Law Firm, we take your health concerns and potential medical malpractice claims extremely seriously.  We hold the highest compassion for the people who come to us who typically are dealing with severe injuries and/or illnesses, the loss of a loved one, and especially financial difficulties.  Our goal is to provide you with an honest assessment of your case. As we have discussed medical malpractice cases are very expensive and difficult to prove but we are experts in this field an our previous work for the insurance industry gives us a distinct advantage over other malpractice law firms who did not previously work for the insurance industry. Let’s put it this way we know what the insurance industry is going to do before they do.

If you or a loved one have been injured in a medical environment give us a call the consultation is free and there is no obligation on your part what so ever.