What Are Some of the Most Common Medical Malpractice Claims?

Electronic Health Records have changed the practice of medicine. Not all these changes are good. The average doctor spends almost six hours a day on EHR-related tasks. When doctors are doing paperwork, they are not focusing on patient care. This lack of focus is most apparent, and most dangerous, in the areas discussed below.

Inattention leads to mistakes. Doctors owe a duty of reasonable care and any mistake may constitute medical malpractice or medical negligence when it causes serious injury. So, if you or a loved one was a victim of such neglect, an Illinois medical malpractice lawyer might be able to obtain substantial compensation for your serious injuries.

Misdiagnosis

Doctor inattention during patient visits is one of the leading causes of medical misdiagnosis. Roughly one in five patients are misdiagnosed. Doctors overlook conditions their patients have or tell their patients they are sick when, in fact, they are healthy. Common misdiagnosis areas include:

• Cancer: According to some studies, the cancer misdiagnosis rate might be twice as high as the overall misdiagnosis rate. Usually, this illness has a very long latency period. Most doctors do not associate symptoms like fatigue and pain with cancer, especially if the patient has no genetic markers or other risk factors.
• Head Injuries: Much like cancer, head injuries usually begin with vague symptoms, like soreness or disorientation. Doctors frequently ascribe these symptoms to shock from a fall, car accident, or another injury. As a result, these patients do not get the treatment they need until their conditions are more advanced.
• Autoimmune Disorders: This category includes a number of relatively rare conditions. The symptoms of these diseases are vague and overlapping. So, doctors often don’t identify the problem straight away. Furthermore, the treatment which works for one autoimmune disorder usually does not work for another one.

Lack of information also contributes to the high misdiagnosis rate. Many doctors are afraid that health insurance companies will not pay for a full battery of diagnostic tests. So, they do not administer them and rely on their instincts.

Birth Injuries

Frequently, these injuries are related to SD. Shoulder Dystocia infants are too large to drift down their mothers’ birth canals. If they get stuck, their umbilical cords can cut off oxygen to their brains. At that point, cerebral palsy may be minutes away.

Doctors should be able to see SD red flags during prenatal visits or when they review charts for walk-in deliveries. However, because of the aforementioned issues, these red flags are often unidentified. Other doctors dismiss warning signs because they think they can handle the difficult delivery on their own.

The situation often deteriorates in the labor and delivery room. Some mechanical interventions, like forceps and vacuum extractors, often do more harm than good.

Surgical Mistakes

It’s hard to believe how many surgical mistakes happen. But they are all too common, especially in busy operating rooms.

Pre-surgical mistakes often include anesthesia errors. Some patients have severe allergic reactions to some medicines. Dosage problems are common as well. The anesthesiologist must give the patient the right amount of medication.

During the procedure, a quick surgical team meeting and a post-procedure instrument count could eliminate some types of negligence. But many doctors are in such a hurry that they do not take these simple precautions.

Infections dominate the list of post-surgical errors. In hospitals full of sick people, infections and contagious diseases can spread like wildfire, especially if the staff does not take all necessary precautions.

Work With with an Assertive Winnebago County Medical Malpractice Attorney

Accident victims are usually entitled to substantial compensation. For a free consultation with an experienced Winnebago County medical malpractice lawyer, contact Fisk & Monteleone, Ltd. by calling 815-315-0574. We do not charge upfront legal fees in these matters.