Mistakes in Surgery
Surgery has a certain amount of uncertainty associated with it and there is always a chance that the result is different than what is expected. With that being said, Doctors should do everything that they can to avoid known errors and monitor vital signs of the patient to avoid mistakes which could cause permanent disability or death. We have heard reports of operations on the wrong person’s brain where diagnostic tools were switched between patients or some other cause. This is why our firm offers free consultations on medical malpractice cases and is willing to review the medical records to determine what happened in surgery. Often these mistakes in Surgery take away, or forever change those we love and representation is very important in obtaining a favorable outcome.
Some mistakes happen more frequently than others. These include:
- Conducting the wrong procedure after not consulting the medical records;
- Damaging blood vessels, nerves, or other tissue while operating;
- Leaving sponges, gauze or other items behind during surgery which causes infection.
- Cutting the wrong part, removing the wrong part, or attempting to repair the wrong part.
In a surgical setting a mistake can have large repercussions and change a patient’s life forever. This is the case in major surgery as well as seemingly routine procedures. The Plaintiff in a medical malpractice case has to prove it is more likely than not that (51%) their presented damages were as a result of the standard of care (the treatment that would be rendered by a reasonable prudent doctor to a patient.
Other mistakes in surgery can include:
- Bacterial or viral infection (red and puffy skin around the site is a clear sign.
- Taking much longer than expected to recover
- Ongoing pain at any level. (often lasting over a lifetime)
- Necessity of having additional surgical procedures to fix what the first surgery messed up.
- Change in body tone or mass
- loss of body part
- Traumatic Brain injury, brain bleed or other injury.
- Nerve damage or loss of feeling in extremities.
- inability to move extremities
- loss of consciousness
- full time loss of work as a result of these injuries
- Injury to an infant
- Wrongul death of a loved one.