Medical malpractice can change your life in an instant and it is a bigger problem than people want to admit. Approximately 80,000 people die in the United States each year from medical malpractice according to a 1990 Harvard Medical Practice Study. A more recent study showed that number to be closer to 98,000. Even more disturbing, these studies do not even include malpractice occurring outside of hospitals. Yet only one malpractice claim is brought for every eight medical malpractice injuries reflecting a lack of proper transparency and lack of representation by an attorney skilled in medical malpractice lawsuits.
How Medical Malpractice Affects You
Medical malpractice often leads to serious and deadly injuries and can cause major changes in your life. Depending on the type of malpractice case, typical damages include pain and suffering, disability and impairment, lost wages, medical bills, and in some cases, lifelong nursing and rehabilitative care. These injuries not only affect the injured person but also the family members of those injured, who are often burdened with having to provide additional care and financial support. The emotional toll can be devastating to all.
You deserve answers and you deserve to know the truth about what went wrong. ROSSETTI & DEVOTO, P.C. will swiftly investigate all substantial injury and wrongful death medical malpractice cases utilizing the most qualified medical experts to advise us on whether deviations took place in the care and treatment.
Types of Medical Malpractice
We have successfully represented persons injured by negligent doctors, nurses, technicians and hospitals who negligently provided health care. Some of these cases include:
- Birth injuries
- Surgical errors
- Delays in the diagnosis of cancer
- Failure to diagnose and treat infections
- Emergency room errors
- Failure to diagnose heart attacks
- Laparoscopic surgical errors
- OB-Gyn malpractice
- Medication errors
- Lasik surgical errors
When you visit the doctor, you expect to be cared for professionally and in accordance with accepted medical and nursing standards. While all medical procedures have accepted risks, no one should have to endure injuries from unacceptable mistakes. Yet, mistakes happen more often than you might think, which is why the medical malpractice lawyers from ROSSETTI & DEVOTO, P.C. want to speak with you.
Doctors and nurses are held to a certain standard of care when treating patients. If they fail to meet that standard of care and you suffer an injury as a result, you have been a victim of medical malpractice and you have every right to seek compensation for your injuries. Before you can file a medical malpractice lawsuit in New Jersey, a medical professional practicing in the same specialty as the defendant doctor must sign an affidavit under penalty of perjury, that based on the medical records there is a reasonable probability that the care and treatment deviated from accepted standards.
Determining the standard of care is an important part of every medical malpractice case. You will need to show through expert testimony what the accepted care and treatment standards were for medical professionals engaging in that treatment or performing that procedure based on what the average member practicing in that specific medical specialty would typically do. Then you will need to show that the professional breached that duty of care and that the breach led to your injuries. Most medical malpractice cases are extremely hard-fought since the doctors, nurses and hospitals’ reputation is on the line. For that reason, Rossetti & DeVoto concentrates on representing those with only the most serious, life-threatening and life-altering injuries.
Examples of Surgical Errors
One of the most common types of medical malpractice is that of a surgical error. Too often patients are scheduled for surgery who then wind up needing a second or third procedure to fix the mistakes made by the surgeon who operated on them initially. Surgical errors are serious mistakes made by surgeons that can leave lasting effects on your body or even lead to death. Common examples of surgical errors include the following:
- Operating on the wrong patient
- Operating on the wrong part of the correct patient
- Performing the wrong type of surgery
- Inadvertently cutting the wrong body part
- Errors with anesthesia
- Leaving a medical device or tool inside the patient
- Not disclosing enough information about the procedure to the patient
- Failing to recognize cardiac arrest during a procedure
- Failing to monitor the patient’s condition during the procedure
- Failing to administer the proper medication before, during, or after the surgery
- Failing to recognize bleeds, surgical errors or other complications before terminating the surgery
Surgical errors can cost you your life. You might develop an infection following the surgery if sutures were not applied correctly or if the incision area is not properly cared for while in the hospital. Infections can cause you to develop an illness or even bleed out internally.
The Danger of a Delayed Diagnosis
Another common type of medical malpractice is a delayed diagnosis of a particular condition. When your doctor fails to properly diagnose your medical condition it can lead to more serious consequences due to lack of timely treatment. If you were exhibiting symptoms of a specific disease or illness and continued to visit the doctor or hospital without getting a proper diagnosis, you might have a case for medical malpractice due to delayed diagnosis. The longer it takes a doctor to properly diagnose you, the further behind you will be in getting proper treating and the more difficult it will be for you to have a complete recovery. The consequences can be deadly.
Delays in diagnosing cancer and infections are two of the most common types of delayed diagnosis cases. Since some symptoms of cancer and infection can be mistaken for other less serious illnesses, doctors might dismiss your worries or worse, try to treat you for that less serious suspicion. However, a doctor’s job is to consider all reasonable, potential diagnosis’ and eliminate the most serious illnesses first. Too often, medical professionals jump right to a diagnosis and then perform testing to confirm their erroneous diagnosis rather than eliminating the most serious potential causes. By the time you are correctly diagnosed, the damage is already done.
Emergency Room Errors
Emergency room errors can be deadly, especially if you are taken to the hospital for respiratory or cardiac issues and the doctors fail to perform the proper tests or administer the correct care. An emergency room error as simple as failing to monitor a patient can lead to serious injuries or even death. The most common emergency room errors include the following:
- Failure to diagnose appendicitis
- Failing to diagnose heart attacks
- Failing to diagnose infection including sepsis
- Failure to manage the care of a patient
- Failure to diagnose a patient
- Failure to conduct a thorough examination of the patient
- Failure to conduct a complete medical history of the patient
- Failure to perform tests that can rule out a life-threatening condition
- Errors with the hospital laboratory tests
- Failing to consult with specialists
- Delays in administering tests
- Medication errors (wrong dosage, failing to administer drugs, wrong drugs)
Who Can be Held Liable?
If you believe you were the victim of medical malpractice, you will want to contact the medical malpractice lawyers at ROSSETTI, DEVOTO, P.C. immediately. Not every potential medical malpractice case will be cut and dry nor will every medical injury result in a case. There could be multiple entities and professionals held responsible for the injuries you suffered because of the negligence of a nurse or doctor who treated you. Some of these include the following:
- Doctor
- Nurse
- Pharmacist
- Hospital
- Drug manufacturer
- Hospital technician
- Medical device manufacturer
It’s possible that more than one defendant is responsible for the harm. It all depends on the circumstances surrounding your case and what your lawyer feels can be proven in court.
Recoverable Damages in a Medical Malpractice Case
You can recover various damages in a medical malpractice case with the help of medical malpractice lawyers from Rossetti & DeVoto, PC. If you are the victim of medical malpractice, you may be able to collect compensation for the following damages:
- Medical and life care expenses
- Pain and suffering
- Disability and impairment
- Reduced quality of life
- Loss of consortium
- Lost wages (past and future)
Should your loved one die as a result of medical malpractice, surviving family members can still file a claim against the parties responsible under the Wrongful Death Act and Survival Act. The Survival Act permits the heirs or spouse of the deceased to obtain damages that occurred from the time of the medical malpractice incident to the time of the victim’s death. However, with regard to pain and suffering, the decedent would have to have been conscious to recover.
The Wrongful Death Act statutes allow the surviving family members to recover expenses for the funeral and burial of their loved one as well as the economic value of any lost guidance, advice, and counseling that would have been given them if the decedent lived.
Navigating the allowable damages laws in medical malpractice cases can be challenging. That’s why it’s vital you work with experienced medical malpractice lawyers from Rossetti & DeVoto, PC.
Contact Malpractice Lawyers Today
If you think you have been a victim of medical malpractice, call us now to discuss your case at no obligation. You deserve to know if you were a victim of medical malpractice and you are entitled to know what went wrong and why. When we investigate your case, we get answers. When we pursue your case, you get justice! We have a proven track record of success against hospitals, doctors, and nurses that provide negligent care. Call now or visit our Frequently Asked Questions to learn more about your potential case. To learn more, click here to read the Medical Malpractice FAQs.
RECENT SETTLEMENTS AND VERDICTS IN MEDICAL and NURSING MALPRACTICE
Results may vary depending on your particular facts and legal circumstances
$9.5 Million medical malpractice settlement for birth injuries sustained shortly after birth at a hospital in South Jersey after a hospital lab worker incorrectly entered a critical lab test result into the hospital’s electronic medical record. Doctors in the NICU then negligently discontinued an anti-viral medication without seeing the actual test result and without obtaining several other tests results, either of which would have alerted them to the error. The medication was needed to treat the herpes simplex virus and had been prophylactically prescribed while awaiting for the test results to come back from another hospital that was better equipped to perform the testing. Because of these catastrophic system failures, the herpes simplex virus went incompletely treated and virus continued to attack. the child’s central nervous system leaving her with brain damage, cerebral palsy and in need of life-long care. Lou DeVoto represented the family.
$1.7 Million settlement for anesthesia malpractice after the anesthesiologist incorrectly inserted a tube in the plaintiff’s esophagus when the plaintiff has a pre-existing artificial opening in the neck from a previous laryngectomy, thirty years before. Andy Rossetti represented the family.
$1.5 Million medical malpractice settlement for the widow, of a 43 year old man, who died after being negligently treated by a doctor and nurse at a South Jersey hospital. Lou DeVoto uncovered grave medication errors made that caused the death.
$— Confidential settlement for a birth injury caused by medical malpractice. Lou DeVoto represented the family.
$— Confidential Medical Malpractice settlement against Hospital of University of Pennsylvania for wrongful discharge of patient leading to infection and death. Lou DeVoto represented the family.
$950,000 medical malpractice settlement for our client who died from the failure of a rehabilitation hospital to position a feeding tube correctly resulting in a massive infection, sepsis and eventual organ failure. The defendant’s denied liability claiming that the patient was compromised before the feeding tube mishap claiming that the incident was not the cause of the death. Lou DeVoto represented the family.
$750,000 jury verdict in Camden County for surgical errors during c-section. There was no offer in the case. Andy Rossetti and Anthony represented RD’s client.
$500,000 settlement for a 17 year old boy who was injured at birth by a doctor who mismanaged his delivery. Lou DeVoto represented the injured minor and his mother
$500,000 settlement for a man whose Hepatitis C infection was misdiagnosed for seven years before the proper referral was made to a hepatologist. Lou DeVoto represented the 60 year old man.
$500,000 Wrongful Death/Medical Malpractice settlement for a 21 year-old Rutgers student who died at North Jersey hospital after they failed to properly run a Code call. The settlement reflects the fact that our client was a student and died without any dependents which in New Jersey severely limits allowable damages. The settlement also reflects the probability that a properly run code may not have saved her life. Lou DeVoto handled the case with Ohio co-counsel James Kelley, III. Trial was underway for several weeks in Essex County, New Jersey before a settlement was reached.
$400,000 medical malpractice settlement for negligent angioplasty procedure that caused a death to our client who was 67. The settlement takes into account that our client was at higher risk for the procedure and had other health related problems that would have likely shortened his life. Lou DeVoto represented the family.
$450,000 medical malpractice settlement for the failure to diagnose a heart attack. This settlement came during jury deliberations. Andrew Rossetti represented the widow.
Medical Links To Help Check On Your Doctor
New Jersey Board of Medical Examiners: Has your NJ doctor been disciplined? http://www.state.nj.us/lps/ca/bme/docdir.htm
State of New Jersey, Doctor Profile Report
http://12.150.185.184/dca/simple_search.jsp
