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Medical Malpractice Lawsuits

Attorneys have a fiduciary responsibilities to their clients and are required to act with diligence, skill and care. Attorneys make mistakes, just like any other professional.

A mistake made by an attorney constitutes legal malpractice. To prove legal malpractice, an aggrieved party has to prove that there was breach of duty, causation, breach and damages. Let's look at each of these elements.

Duty

Medical professionals and doctors take an oath to apply their knowledge and expertise to cure patients, not cause additional harm. A patient's legal right to be compensated for injuries sustained from medical malpractice rests on the notion of duty of care. Your attorney can determine if your doctor's actions violated the duty of care and if the breach resulted in your injury or illness.

To prove a duty to care, your lawyer will need to establish that a medical professional has a legal relationship with you and owed you a fiduciary responsibility to exercise reasonable skill and care. This relationship can be established by eyewitness testimony, physician-patient records and expert testimony of doctors who have similar education, experience and training.

Your lawyer will also have to prove that the medical professional violated their duty of care by not living up to the standards of practice that are accepted in their field. This is often referred to as negligence, and your attorney will evaluate the defendant's conduct with what a reasonable person would perform in the same situation.

Your lawyer will also need to prove that the breach by the defendant directly contributed to your loss or injury. This is known as causation, and your attorney will rely on evidence such as your doctor-patient documents, witness statements and expert testimony to prove that the defendant's inability to meet the standards of care in your case was a direct cause of your injury or loss.

Breach

A doctor has a responsibility of care for his patients that corresponds to professional medical standards. If a doctor does not meet the standards, and the resulting failure causes an injury and/or medical malpractice, then negligence could occur. Expert testimonials from medical professionals who have the same training, certifications as well as experience and qualifications can help determine the standard of care in a particular situation. Federal and state laws, as well as policies of the institute, help determine what doctors are required to do for certain types of patients.

To be successful in a malpractice case, it must be proven that the doctor acted in violation of his or her duty of take care of patients and that the breach was the direct cause of an injury. This is referred to in legal terms as the causation element and it is vital that it be established. For example an injured arm requires an xray, the doctor must properly set the arm and place it in a cast to ensure proper healing. If the physician failed to do so and the patient was left with an irreparable loss of use of that arm, then malpractice could have occurred.

Causation

Legal malpractice claims are based on the evidence that the attorney made mistakes that caused financial losses to the client. For example the lawyer does not file a lawsuit within the statute of limitations, resulting in the case being lost forever the party who suffered damages can bring legal malpractice actions.

However, it's important to recognize that not all mistakes made by lawyers are a sign of illegal. The mistakes that involve strategy and planning are not generally considered to be malpractice attorneys have a lot of latitude to make judgment calls as long as they're reasonable.

In addition, the law allows attorneys considerable leeway to fail to conduct discovery on behalf of behalf of a client, so long as it was not negligent or unreasonable. Failing to discover important facts or documents, such as medical reports or witness statements can be a case of legal malpractice. Other examples of malpractice are the inability to add certain defendants or claims, such as forgetting a survival count for the case of wrongful death or the constant failure to communicate with clients.

It's also important to note that it must be proven that but the negligence of the lawyer the plaintiff would have won the case. Otherwise, the plaintiff's claim for malpractice will be denied. This requirement makes bringing legal malpractice claims difficult. For this reason, it's important to choose a seasoned attorney to represent you.

Damages

To win a legal malpractice lawsuit plaintiffs must show financial losses incurred by the actions of an attorney. This must be shown in a lawsuit by utilizing evidence like expert testimony, correspondence between the client and attorney as well as billing records and other documents. The plaintiff must also show that a reasonable attorney could have prevented the harm caused by the negligence of the lawyer. This is referred to as the proximate cause.

The act of malpractice can be triggered in a variety of different ways. The most frequent mistakes are: failing to meet a deadline or statute of limitations; not conducting an investigation into a conflict in a case; applying the law incorrectly to a client's particular situation; and breaking an obligation of fiduciary (i.e. mixing trust account funds with personal attorney accounts) or mishandling an instance, and not communicating with clients.

Medical malpractice lawsuits typically include claims for compensation damages. These compensate the victim for out-of-pocket expenses and losses, including hospital and medical bills, costs of equipment required to aid in recovery, and loss of wages. Additionally, victims may be able to claim non-economic damages such as suffering and suffering and loss of enjoyment of life and emotional distress.

Legal malpractice cases usually involve claims for compensatory or punitive damages. The former is intended to compensate victims for losses due to the negligence of the attorney while the latter is intended to deter future malpractice lawyers on the defendant's part.