Each year, people are seriously harmed or injured while in the care of a medical professional. These incidents number in the thousands – as many as 25,000 incidents of medical errors every year in Florida. Sadly, many of these patients suffer permanent disabilities or even death. Medical errors can and do happen, even when a doctor or other professional was caring and concerned. Common types of medical malpractice claims include misdiagnosis, delay in treatment, overdosing, or surgical mistakes. The law firm of Allen & Murphy has been standing up for the rights of medical malpractice victims for more than 20 years and has substantial experience in these cases. See a few of our past results here on this site.

What exactly constitutes medical malpractice? Malpractice arises from a professional's misconduct or failure to use adequate levels of care, skill or diligence in the performance of that professional's duties, and this misconduct causes harm to another person. Medical malpractice typically is identified when a professional fails to exercise his or her professional skills at the same level of care, skill and learning applied in similar circumstances by an average reputable member of the same profession. Consider these Florida statistics:

Six percent of the doctors in Florida are responsible for half the medical malpractice claims. Public Citizen’s analysis of the federal government’s National Practitioner Data Bank information found that 2,674 of the state’s 44,747 doctors have paid two or more malpractice awards to patients. These doctors are responsible for 51 percent of all payments.
Many of Florida’s most dangerous doctors continue to practice and the state watchdog is not doing its job. There are 1,555 physicians who have been disciplined by Florida’s state medical and osteopathic boards for incompetence, prescription errors, sexual misconduct, criminal convictions, ethical lapses and other offenses.

Rate increases are up for many other types of insurance in Florida. Doctors like to blame lawyers and the legal system for rising malpractice insurance rates. But these rate increases are largely the result of the economics of the insurance industry.

In order for medical malpractice to be punishable, injury, loss or damage must be suffered by the person who retained the healthcare professional's services, however, the person who has received the medical treatment or procedure is rarely in a position to know whether or not there was malpractice, and the medical professional who performed the service may be unwilling to admit that he or she did anything wrong. Often an attorney – with the help of medical industry experts – is best suited for assessing whether or not malpractice took place.

Examples of medical malpractice claims

Cancer – Did not diagnose
Unreasonable delay in treatment
Post-surgical infection
Surgical error
Spinal cord damage from chiropractic manipulation
Medication error – wrong medicine or dangerous mix of medicines (drug interaction)
Drug overdose
Allergic reactions caused by an error in treatment / medicines
Neglect in a hospital or nursing home or other abuse
Nursing home slip and fall
Birth-related injuries