Medical Malpractice Takes Enormous Toll on American Families

Kahn Gauthier Swick is investigating any lawsuit on behalf of patients who were harmed by medical malpractice, and their families. Medical malpractice encompasses all negligence by medical care providers that causes harm to the patient. A lawsuit seeking to recover for medical malpractice will be filed against the physicians or other medical care providers, such as nurses or radiologists, who were negligent. The medical facility where the patient was treated may also be named as a defendant.

Medical malpractice takes an enormous toll on American families. A 1999 study by the Institute of Medicine, which is part of the National Academy of Sciences, estimated that each year between 44,000 and 98,000 hospital patients in the U.S. die from medical malpractice. While some critics have challenged these figures, other authorities stress that this study involved only deaths to hospitalized patients and did not cover deaths from medical malpractice committed in outpatient surgery or in the course of patients' treatment by their physicians in office visits and all other outpatient settings.

New Jersey Doctors Lose Fight to Keep Malpractice Payments Private

Malpractice payments made by New Jersey doctors became public for the first time, detailing close to $1 billion paid out to injured patients in the past five years, often in confidential settlements. The state's doctors fought bitterly to keep the information from reaching the public, arguing that court settlements have little to do with a physician's competence. But a federal judge disagreed, saying the information could be critical to consumers making healthcare decisions. U.S. District Judge William G. Bassler issued an order from the bench that allowed the state to release the names and malpractice payouts of 2,333 doctors. The data included 2,833 cases, because some physicians were sued more than once. The information covers the past five years, when the state's doctors made a total of $890,311,551 in malpractice payments. The payments are nearly always made by the insurance companies that provide malpractice coverage for the doctors. The data show that just more than 10 percent of the state's 22,000 physicians accounted for all the malpractice payments made in the past five years.

Example of Medical Malpractice Lawsuit

Medical malpractice can occur in a large array of settings:

• When a physician fails to properly diagnose the patient's condition, or delays in making the correct diagnosis.
• When a physician fails to properly treat the patient's condition.
• When a laboratory technician fails to properly conduct a test.
• When a physician erroneously interprets an X-ray.
• When a nurse or the hospital pharmacy gives the patient the wrong drug, or the wrong strength of the right drug.
• When a physician or the hospital staff fails to take precautions against foreseeable complications.
• Medical malpractice when a physician fails to get the patient's informed consent for the medical treatment.
• When a physician prescribes a drug to which the patient is allergic, without first checking for such an allergy.
• When a medical facility fails to provide proper nursing care.

Our full article contains more information about the Medical Malpractice lawsuit.

Additional Reference

Make No Mistake: Medical Errors Can Be Deadly Serious"

This article was published in the September-October 2000 issue of FDA Consumer magazine.

"To Err Is Human: Building a Safer Health System"

The full text of the 1999 report from the Institute of Medicine that revealed the shockingly high rate of medical malpractice in the United States.