If you have suffered an injury from a medical professional who has made a mistake in their treatment, you may be entitled to substantial financial compensation. To begin the legal process, you will need to file a medical malpractice lawsuit. This case will attempt to establish that the doctor was negligent and caused your injuries. If you can make this showing, you may be eligible for a settlement check or a monetary award from a jury. You should always hire a medical malpractice lawyer for your case because these are often difficult lawsuits that are not always easy to prove.
Negligence Has a Role in Every Personal Injury Case
Negligence is the broader term that is at play in any type of personal injury case. It is what you will need to prove to persuade an insurance company to make you a settlement offer or a jury to award you money. Negligence is when someone does not uphold the duty of care that they owed you under the circumstances. It is wrongful action, and the fact that negligence occurred can entitle you to money when you can prove it.
There are different ways that people can be negligent. A driver can be negligent when they do something like rear-end your car or fail to check their blindspots before they change lanes. A property owner can be negligent when they fail to clear debris from a walking path and suffer a slip and fall injury.
Medical Malpractice Is a Form of Negligence
Practically anyone can be negligent and cause you injury. Any time you leave the home, seek a service, or buy a product, you may be a potential victim of negligence. The same holds true when you have sought treatment from a medical provider. They, too, can be negligent in providing you with their services, and it can cause you injury.
Medical malpractice is the way that the doctor can be negligent. In other words, medical malpractice is one subset of negligence. If you are able to prove that the doctor committed malpractice, you may be entitled to a substantial amount of financial compensation for your injuries.
How to Prove Negligence in a Medical Malpractice Case
You can prove negligence when you can meet each of the following four elements:
- Someone else owed you the duty of care
- They did not uphold that duty of care because they did something which would be considered unreasonable under the circumstances
- You suffered an injury
- You would not have suffered an injury but for the actions of the defendant
In a medical malpractice case, the professional will assume a duty of care when they give you any form of treatment. It can be a doctor, pharmacy, or other type of health care service. They must act reasonably under the circumstances, or else they can be liable to you for your injuries.
Medical Professionals Are Held to the Standard of an Average Doctor
It is important to understand context in a medical malpractice case. While the doctor must uphold their own duty of care, they are held to the standard of what a reasonable doctor would have done under the circumstances. The average doctor is not necessarily the top professional in their field who was trained at Harvard Medical School. They do not have to act in the way that a preeminent expert would have done under the circumstances. However, they also cannot make errors or have lapses in judgment that will injure you.
Poor Results Does Not Always Mean That Negligence Is at Play
Further, not every single medical treatment that you receive will lead to the exact results that you want. Not every surgery goes well, and you may still end up with adverse medical results, and it is not always the doctor’s fault. You will have to show that it was the doctor’s specific actions that caused your injuries. Then, you will have to overcome their own defense that the poor result would have happened anyway, and they were not the cause of your injuries.
How to Prove That a Doctor Was Negligent in Your Case
Proving a medical malpractice case is not always easy. The medical provider will certainly not admit to a mistake, and you will need to piece together exactly what happened to cause your injury. Then, you will need to persuade a jury that the medical professional departed from the standard of care, assuming that your case does not settle before that point.
When you hire a medical malpractice lawyer, they will work with expert witnesses to prove your case. A medical expert will give their opinion on what the doctor may have done wrong and what a reasonable medical professional would have done under the circumstances. Since doctors have a natural amount of credibility in the eyes of a jury, the fact that you have a respected doctor of your own testifying on your behalf can lend some persuasiveness to your case. Expert witnesses can reconstruct what happened in the doctor’s office or the operating room, and they can show exactly what went wrong and why you deserve to be compensated.
Your medical malpractice attorney can also build your case once you have already filed a lawsuit. In every trial process, there is a phase called discovery. You may not have all the evidence you need in your hands at the beginning of your case, but you can request it from the defendant if the proof is in their hands. Your medical malpractice lawyer will also be able to talk directly to the doctor and other staff and hear from them in their own words about what happened.
Depositions are a very important tool in a medical malpractice lawsuit because you will get direct access to the doctor. If your medical malpractice attorney can elicit helpful evidence during discovery and depositions, it can persuade the defendant to settle your case on terms that are more advantageous to you.
Hire a Trusted Attorney For Best Results in Your Medical Malpractice or Negligence Case
You have suffered an injury due as a result of medical malpractice or negligence by a medical professional or institution. You should always contact a personal injury law firm in Mclean, VA with experience in this area. They know the laws and will fight for you.