Doctor malpractice is one of the scariest possibilities when you are going in to be treated by a physician. Whether or not you are going to their office or seeing them in a hospital, it is important that you understand what doctor malpractice is and if you can or should file a claim.
The first item to address is yes, you can file a claim if you are a victim of doctor malpractice. It doesn't matter that you signed a form when you went in to see the doctor or checked into the hospital granting consent for treatment. You gave permission for a procedure to be carried out properly, by proper staff. Don't let the hospital, doctor or attorney for any of these entities try to tell you otherwise. You have the right to seek damages for the injury or loss that you suffered.
This is not to say that if you are not happy with the result of a treatment, procedure or office visit that you can sue the doctor.
There are certain requirements that must be there for it to be considered malpractice. For example, if your doctor does not treat a problem correctly, new problems can arise from the wrong treatment. You can file a doctor malpractice suit.If through the negligence of your doctor a diagnosis is given too late for a treatment to do any good for you or your loved one, this is grounds for a malpractice suit. Likewise if the wrong diagnosis is given and then the wrong treatment is given you have grounds for a malpractice suit. During a procedure where the patient is under anesthesia or if the patient is having surgery and there are things that go wrong that could have easily been prevented by the doctor, you have grounds for malpractice.
The wrong medication being prescribed or the wrong dosage being prescribed can also be grounds for malpractice.
It may seem as though a malpractice suit can happen over many things, and it can. What you need to know is that you are going to need to provide documentation. This is why it is important that you get a copy of your medical records, and that you keep them. You should also keep track of any and all discharge instructions you are given when leaving the office or the hospital. The last thing you want to have happen is a loss of the doctor malpractice suit because the documentation was not there. As well, you may want to also keep a diary of your own notes, since if things start to really go south, you may not be in a position to remember things accurately.Everyone should also know that malpractice is not limited to your physician. Professionals such as dentists, lawyers and doctors can all have malpractice suits drawn up against them. By law, malpractice is the dereliction of a professional's duty due to negligence or incompetence by that professional or the institution.