A Malpractice Attorney Success Story You ll Never Believe

Medical Malpractice Lawsuits

Attorneys have a fiduciary duty to their clients and they must behave with skill, diligence and care. Attorneys make mistakes, just like any other professional.

Not all mistakes made by lawyers are considered to be malpractice. To prove legal malpractice, an aggrieved party must show duty, breach, causation and damages. Let's look at each of these aspects.

Duty

Medical professionals and malpractice Lawsuit doctors swear an oath that they will use their expertise and knowledge to cure patients, not causing further harm. A patient's legal right to compensation for injuries sustained due to medical malpractice is based on the notion of duty of care. Your attorney can assist you determine whether or not your doctor's actions breached this duty of care, and whether these breaches caused injury or illness to you.

To establish a duty of care, your lawyer has to demonstrate that a medical professional has a legal relationship with you and had a fiduciary obligation to perform their duties with an acceptable level of competence and care. Establishing that this relationship existed may require evidence such as the records of your doctor-patient eyewitness accounts and expert testimony from doctors who have similar experience, education and training.

Your lawyer will also need to show that the medical professional breached their duty to care by not adhering to the accepted standards of their field. This is typically known as negligence. Your lawyer will assess the actions of the defendant to what a reasonable individual would do in a similar situation.

Your lawyer must also show that the defendant's negligence directly contributed to your injury or loss. This is known as causation. Your lawyer will make use of evidence, such as your doctor/patient reports, witness testimony and expert testimony, to demonstrate that the defendant's inability to meet the standards of care was the direct cause of injury or loss to you.

Breach

A doctor owes patients duties of care that are consistent with the highest standards of medical professionalism. If a doctor fails to adhere to these standards and the failure results in an injury that is medically negligent, negligence could result. Expert witness testimony from medical professionals that have the same training, certifications as well as experience and qualifications can help determine the standard of care for a specific situation. State and federal laws and institute policies can also be used to determine what doctors should do for specific types of patients.

To prevail in a malpractice lawsuit it must be proven that the doctor violated his or his duty of care and that this breach was the direct cause of an injury. This is referred to in legal terms as the causation element, and it is vital to prove it. For instance, if a broken arm requires an x-ray, the doctor must properly set the arm and then place it in a cast for proper healing. If the physician failed to do this and the patient was left with an irreparable loss of use of the arm, then malpractice may have occurred.

Causation

Lawyer malpractice claims are based on the evidence that the lawyer made errors that resulted in financial losses to the client. For example the lawyer fails to file an action within the timeframe of limitations, which results in the case being lost forever the party who suffered damages could bring legal malpractice lawsuits.

It is important to understand that not all mistakes made by attorneys constitute malpractice. Planning and strategy errors aren't usually considered to be a sign of the definition of malpractice. Attorneys have a wide decision-making discretion to make decisions as long as they're rational.

The law also allows attorneys ample discretion to refrain from performing discovery for a client provided that the reason for the delay was not unreasonable or a case of negligence. The failure to discover crucial information or documents, such as medical reports or statements of witnesses can be a case of legal malpractice lawyers. Other instances of malpractice include the failure to add certain defendants or claims, for instance the mistake of not remembering a survival number for a wrongful-death case, or the repeated failure to communicate with clients.

It is also important to keep in mind the fact that the plaintiff has to prove that, if not due to the lawyer's negligent behavior they would have won their case. The claim of malpractice by the plaintiff is rejected in the event that it is not proved. This makes the process of bringing legal malpractice lawsuits difficult. It is essential to choose an experienced attorney.

Damages

A plaintiff must demonstrate that the lawyer's actions led to actual financial losses in order to win a legal malpractice lawsuit. In the case of a lawsuit this has to be proved with evidence, like expert testimony or correspondence between the attorney and the client. A plaintiff must also prove that a reasonable lawyer could have prevented the harm caused by the negligence of the lawyer. This is known as proximate cause.

Malpractice occurs in many ways. Some of the more common types of malpractice include: failing to meet a deadline, for example, the statute of limitations, failure to perform a conflict check or other due diligence of a case, improperly applying law to a client's circumstance or breaching a fiduciary obligation (i.e. mixing trust funds with attorney's personal accounts), mishandling of an instance, and failing to communicate with a client.

In the majority of medical malpractice cases the plaintiff will seek compensation damages. They compensate the victim for expenses out of pocket and losses, such as medical and hospital bills, costs of equipment that aids in recovery, and lost wages. Victims are also able to claim non-economic damages such as pain and discomfort or loss of enjoyment in their lives, and emotional stress.

In a lot of legal malpractice cases, there are lawsuits for punitive as well as compensatory damages. The former compensates victims for losses resulting from the negligence of the attorney, whereas the latter is designed to deter any future malpractice committed by the defendant.