Medical malpractice can occur in a variety of ways. The following is a list by specialty of medical malpractice cases that we most commonly see in our practice:
Anesthesiology Malpractice: This may include a failure to perform a thorough patient assessment, read the patient's medical chart or consider the patient's medical history, or to complete the patient assessment; or improper intubation/positioning of the patient, or failing to monitor the patient during a procedure, or to treat or manage a change in the patient's condition during a procedure, or to properly monitor a patient after a procedure.
Cardiology Malpractice: This may include misdiagnosis of, and failure to treat myocardial infarction ("heart attack"), or congestive heart failure ("CHF"), complications from catheterization, and failing to diagnose, treat and manage post catherization perforations, and complications such as sepsis and internal bleeding, mismanagement of medication such as anticoagulants, and failing to diagnose cardiac conditions such as endocarditis; it may also include a failure to hospitalize a patient after EKG changes, or other diagnostic tests, indicate the need for such hospitalization.
Dermatology Malpractice: This may include failure to diagnose skin cancer; improper treatment of psoriasis; improper treatment of acne; improper surgical technique in cutaneous or cryosurgery, and in treating and diagnosing auto-immune disorders.
Emergency Medicine Malpractice: This may include failure to diagnose myocardial infarction (heart attack), stroke, spinal fractures, appendicitis, compartment syndrome, viral or bacterial meningitis, spinal cord compression, or bowel obstruction. It may also include a failure to call in appropriate medical or surgical consults to treat a patient, a failure to admit a patient, an improper and pre-mature discharge of a patient from an emergency room, a failure of communication between nurses and emergency room physicians in the emergency room, a failure to order the appropriate diagnostic tests, such as EKGs, CT scans, X-rays, or blood work, and a failure of the emergency room physicians to timely communicate with the medical personnel performing tests ordered on the patient.
Family Physician/Primary Care Physician (PCP) Malpractice: This may include a failure to follow good and accepted obstetrical practices when treating an expectant mother and her child; a failure to diagnose breast cancer, prostate cancer, myocardial infarction (heart attack), congestive heart failure, aneurysm, subarachnoid hemorrhage, abdominal or spinal abscess, and may also include a failure to refer a patient out to a specialist for medical care beyond what the family physician or primary care physician is capable of providing; and may also include failing to order appropriate tests to diagnose a patient, failing to monitor a patient's condition while the patient is on prescribed medication, and failing to read or review blood or other diagnostic test results when received; and may also include a failure to advise the patient of the appropriate risks of any course of medical treatment, or of the likelihood of adverse events occurring after the procedure.
Gastroenterology (GI) Malpractice: This may include a failure to diagnose or test for abdominal cancer (prostate cancer or colorectal cancer), appendicitis, esophageal stricture, gall stones; it may also include a failure to properly follow a patient after a endoscopy, colonoscopy, or Endoscopic Retrograde Cholangiopancreatography ("ERCP") and to detect, manage and treat complications from those procedures, including post-operative bleeding and perforations.
General Surgery Malpractice: This may include improper surgical technique, and failing to detect, treat and manage complications of gall bladder surgery, hernia surgery, breast surgery, abdominal surgery, gastric by pass surgery, and lung surgery; these claims may also include a failure to refer the patient's case to a specialist surgeon with more experience and skills, a failure to refer a patient to a specialist in another field when needed such as a physician in infectious disease, and improper supervision and oversight of residents and interns while performing surgical procedures.
Hospital Malpractice: This may include medication errors; failure to follow the rules and statutes enforced by the New York State Department of Health; allowing untrained or unqualified medical personnel to treat patients without proper supervision; improper nursing staffing with decreases in patient care standards, inadequate chart documentation; failure to coordinate patient care among the various specialties, and to communicate between physicians, nurses and medical providers testing the patient; treatment decisions made without properly-informed patient consent; clerical/administration errors affecting patient care, and failing to carry out tests ordered, or to report back in a timely fashion test results.
Internal Medicine Malpractice: As with the family practice physician, these claims may include failure to diagnose or test for breast cancer, bronchus/lung cancer, bladder, colon and prostrate cancer, myocardial infarction (heart attack), viral encephalitis, temporal arteritis; and may also include a failure to send the patient to a hospital on evidence of an emergency condition such as unstable angina, stroke, and a failure to read x-ray or imaging reports demonstrating potentially life threatening conditions such as an abdominal aortic aneurysm, diverticulitis, and developing abscesses.
Midwifery/Nurse Practitioner/Physician Assistant Malpractice: Government reimbursement programs and private health insurance companies have attempted to reduce the cost of medicine by forcing doctor's reimbursement rates downward. In order to keep the same level of income, doctors have been forced to "treat" more patients in less time. To achieve this task, the medical profession has resorted to having patients examined, diagnosed and treated, whenever possible, by medical individuals who are not physicians. More and more patients are "treated" with out ever seeing a licensed physician. Under these circumstances, doctors have become supervisors who review the decisions of medical extenders, are available to answer their questions or to take over the care of the patient if it is beyond the expertise or capability of the non-physician. New York, as with most other states, will allow this form of "treatment" as long as the extender completes the necessary minimum training, applies for the appropriate license, and identifies a physician who agrees to supervise their work. The supervision, however, does not require that the doctor actually see or even speak with the patient. In many instances, all the doctor needs to do is to review the records of the medical extender at some reasonable point in time after the patient has been "treated". Because these supervising doctors will often, only, have access to what the extender has already concluded, the patient may have been misdiagnoses, clinical signs and symptoms may have been missed or ignored or the review takes place long after the patient was sent home and the delay in correcting the mistake has caused permanent injury.
Obstetrics-Gynecology (OB/GYN) Malpractice: improper reading of fetal monitor strip; improper use of vacuum device or forceps; failure to do a timely c-section; or any other error resulting in serious birth injuries or fetal complications, cerebral palsy, beta strep
Pediatrics Malpractice: treatment/resuscitation issues of newborns, diagnosis/treatment of infectious disease (such as perinatal group b beta strep); medication errors for chronic problems
Neurology Malpractice: failure to diagnose herniated disc; improper treatment of seizure disorder; failure to treat risk of stroke
Ophthalmology Malpractice: cataract surgery; treatment of retinal detachments; diagnosis and treatment of glaucoma; improperly performed laser procedures (including vision correction procedures)
Orthopedics Malpractice: surgical complications of intervertebral disc; surgery/treatment of femur fractures; carpal tunnel syndrome; failure to timely diagnose compartment syndrome
Otolaryngology (ENT) Malpractice: treatment/surgery of sinusitis; treatment of upper respiratory diseases
Plastic Surgery Malpractice: reduction mammoplasty; augmentation mammoplasty; rhytidectomy
Psychiatry Malpractice: failure to properly treat depression; improper treatment of personality disorder; sexual contact
Radiology Malpractice: misdiagnosis of breast cancer, lung cancer; complications from invasive procedures
Urology Malpractice: improper treatment of renal calculi; prostate surgery error; misdiagnosis of renal disorders
Contact Powers & Santola today to schedule a free consultation with an experienced upstate New York attorney familiar with all types of medical malpractice claims.
