According to the 2003 annual report from the US Department of Health and Human Services, 10,403 physicians, 105 nurses and 1499 dentists from Michigan were involved in medical malpractice payments for the period 1990-2003. Medicine is not an exact science. The causes of many diseases are still not known. Many drugs have harmful side effects. Medicine is a broad field that includes pharmaceuticals, health care provisions and nursing homes. When the body is treated for any abnormality, things can go wrong at the drug-absorbing stage, during hospitalization and during recuperation. Pharmaceutical companies may be held responsible if the drug was responsible for any adverse effect, and health care providers held responsible if they made mistakes. Medical malpractice is defined as a negligent act by a health-care provider that results in injury or death. A negligent act is one where no reasonable health-care provider would have done the same thing under the same circumstances. Negligence can include misdiagnosis of a disease, administering the wrong medication, or failure to inform a patient about the risks of a procedure or alternative treatments. A lawyer should be consulted in order to determine these factors: liability, damages and cost to settle damages. Liability is about deciding if the health provider is responsible. To prove this, a testimony of an expert is required. The extent of damages has to be determined to decide whether the case is worth fighting. The statute of limitations states that medical malpractice claims must be brought within a period of two years. This can be extended when the patient is a minor or when the effects of a malpractice are known later. Medical malpractice lawsuits take a long time to settle. Attorneys take these cases on a contingency basis. The fees are a percentage of the claims. |
