In the current scenario of rising medical care costs and a demanding medical insurance payout system, being aware about your rights to suitable treatment becomes extremely vital. We have all come across terms like ‘medical negligence’ or ‘fatal medical errors’ that are often highlighted in the daily media coverage. However, not many of us realize what constitutes a medical mistake and more importantly, what kind of medical mistakes can be pursued in the form a filing a personal injury claim.
Medical Mistakes seem to have different interpretations, varying from one state to another. However, some basic types of medical mistakes have been commonly acknowledged. These include:
- Diagnostic Mistakes (explained below)
- Technical Mistakes (mistakes related to interpretation of medical tests/laboratory reports and errors in surgical procedures)
- Medication-related errors (mistakes in prescribing/dispensing medication, such as ignoring medical history like allergic reactions, at the time of prescribing a drug)
- Nosocomial infections (infections caught within a medical care facility—commonly called hospital-acquired infections)
It has been noted that most Personal Injury Lawsuits related to medical mistakes seem to arise from Diagnostic Mistakes. It is worth mentioning that ‘misdiagnosis’ is a commonly-used word, often used to refer to Diagnostic Mistakes. However, every diagnostic mistake isn’t necessarily a case of misdiagnosis. There are several other types of diagnostic mistakes.
It is considered a Self-diagnostic mistake if you have been taking medications without seeking a professional medical opinion, then the resulting complications cannot be used as grounds to file for a personal injury claim. Self-diagnostic mistakes rule-out the chances of filing a claim against a healthcare center or the pharma company manufacturing the drug.
The term Condition-not-diagnosed is used to describe a situation in which an attending physician fails to recognize an existing symptom. The physician may fail to diagnose a condition that might be showing passive symptoms but is serious enough to take the form of a critical, life-threatening condition at a later stage. A personal injury lawsuit can be filed even if the physician diagnosed the disease causing the most obvious symptoms but failed to recognize the underlying or associated diseases.
A Misdiagnosis is most easily understood as being ‘wrongly diagnosed’. This perhaps is the most damaging kind of medical mistake that can be committed since a mistaken diagnose creates the risk of worsening the present symptoms along with inducing new, more lethal complications due to the prescription of wrong medications. Please understand that even if the overall diagnosis is correct, i.e. the major condition has been correctly diagnosed, but the wrong sub-type or variant of the disease is diagnosed, it creates sufficient grounds to seek consultation from a Personal Injury Lawyer.
Handling Medical Mistakes
Yes, it is true that the responsibility of preventing medical mistakes includes the entire medical community, including the recommending/attending healthcare practitioners, the nursing staff, pharmacists and professionals involved in pathological laboratories/test centers. However, it is also your responsibility to ensure that you are being provided the appropriate kind of medical care.
For starters, double-checking your diagnosis and seeking a second opinion almost guarantees that most of the obvious diagnostic mistakes are identified. If you do have a family history of certain medical conditions that haven’t been highlighted in your patient profile, you should talk about them with your physician.
Similarly, if you are allergic to certain drugs or certain drug-manufacturing brands, it is vital to discuss this information with your healthcare provider and cross-check it with a pharmacist. Maintaining updated records of your past illnesses and treatment also helps in providing the doctor, an immediate and easy-to-understand way of assessing your medical condition.
And lastly, if you realize that you too are a victim of a medical mistake, you should employ the services of a qualified Personal Injury Lawyer. This isn’t only about getting a financial compensation but also about setting an example of being an aware and responsible citizen.
