Most of us look to doctors as honorable, trustworthy, and competent professionals who have our best interests at heart when we seek treatment. Even if you’re meeting a doctor for the first time based on a recommendation or under emergency situations, you put your trust into that profession to provide you with a standard of care.
However, here at GDH Law, we’ve witnessed how this isn’t always true. Physicians, nurses, counselors, and other medical professionals can make mistakes, causing patients to suffer adverse health consequences, including death.
In fact, a study published by StatPearls in 2024 by the National Library of Medicine detailed how more than 400,000 hospital patients suffer some type of preventable harm every year.
This is where a medical malpractice attorney comes in. They advocate for victims who’ve suffered injuries or illnesses at the hands of a healthcare provider.
We’re prepared to do the same for you. So, get in touch with our law office to be connected with a College Park medical malpractice lawyer who can help you understand what legal options you have. It’s free.
What Is a Certificate of Merit?
All medical malpractice claims that are filed in Maryland fall under the regulations provided by the Health Care Malpractice Claims Statute (HCMCA) that was enacted in 1976. The statute requires that plaintiffs file with the Director of the Maryland Health Claims Arbitration Office before filing a Circuit Court claim.
After you file that initial claim, you have 90 days to file a certificate of merit. That certificate is a kind of affidavit from an independent medical practitioner in a field related to your injury.
It’s meant to detail the preliminary evidence to confirm that your claim has merit to proceed. This is not the final resolution. In fact, the doctor who wrote the certificate might not even be called on in your case.
While these deadlines and documents might seem overwhelming to obtain, the attorneys at GDH are extremely familiar with the process. We ensure that our clients meet every filing deadline.
We also rely on a network of medical professionals to provide expert testimony and certification in order for us to prevail.
What Qualifies as Medical Malpractice in Maryland?
Malpractice is different than an unfavorable outcome. A doctor can treat a patient and provide the recommended course of surgery, medication, or physical therapy, and it still might not be able to fully cure a patient. That is not malpractice.
On the other hand, a specific negligent act from a medical professional that causes direct harm can rise to the level of a medical malpractice claim.
Medical negligence can include the following forms:
- Misdiagnoses or delayed diagnoses: An incorrect diagnosis may occur because a doctor fails to ask the correct questions or order the correct imaging to make the correct one. Situations like these may result in a patient receiving the wrong treatment or an untimely one, which can cause their condition to deteriorate.
- Radiological errors: The physician reading X-rays, CT scans, MRIs, ultrasounds, and other imaging studies must do so correctly. Otherwise, a condition may be incorrectly diagnosed or untreated, leading to a decline in a patient’s health.
- Anesthesia and surgical errors: Most outpatient medical procedures and surgeries are performed under a sedative, and careless calculations of the appropriate doses can cause a patient to have breathing difficulties and other issues. Additionally, instances where surgical instruments are left in patients, the wrong body part is treated, and other avoidable mistakes occur during surgery, which can leave a patient in a worse state than when they initially went into the operating room.
- Medication errors: A physician may make a mistake when prescribing a drug, such as not checking to see if there may be any interaction with another medication the patient is taking. Additionally, a nurse or pharmacist may administer the wrong drug or the incorrect dosage to a patient. According to a medication dispensing study published by StatPearls, dosage errors or improperly prescribed medications lead to 7,000 to 9,000 deaths each year.
- Informed consent issues: Doctors have an obligation to advise patients who are preparing to undergo certain treatments, such as surgeries, of their diagnosis, the benefits and downsides associated with recommended treatment options, as well as alternate options available. This should be done in a way and language that is understandable to the patient. They should also be allowed to ask questions. If a doctor fails to properly advise a patient and something goes awry while they’re performing a procedure, a patient may be able to sue them for that poor outcome.
- Childbirth injuries: Many potential injuries to mom and baby, known as birth injuries, can be greatly minimized with adequate prenatal care and in-hospital monitoring. However, if doctors fail to pay attention to and respond to indicators, serious harm can occur. For example, deprivation of oxygen can result in Cerebral Palsy or the fetus getting trapped in the mom’s pelvis, the latter of which can result in shoulder dystocia.
- Misreading pathology: Pathologists are physicians who train, in part, by studying slides of confirmed diagnoses, say of a condition like cancer, versus ones showing non-malignant (benign) results. A pathologist’s reading of the slide under the microscope can impact the course of treatment a doctor recommends and thus a patient’s prognosis, so when they make a mistake, the consequences can be significant.
The examples of medical malpractice highlighted above are only a few of the many ways doctors and other healthcare providers can make mistakes that have significant long-term implications on a patient’s life.
You owe it to yourself to consult with a College Park medical malpractice lawyer about what happened to you or a family member so that they can determine if negligence played a role in the outcome.
Your attorney may advise you that you have a viable claim if they find that the provider deviated from the typical standard of care in your case.
Healthcare Providers You Can Hold Liable for Malpractice
Unfortunately, medical malpractice and negligence occur all too frequently in the US. The American Medical Association (AMA) reports that, in 2022, nearly one-third (31.2%) of healthcare providers reported that they’d previously been sued for negligence or error.
From the descriptions of these different types of medical malpractice, you might be able to come up with at least a partial list of one or more medical providers you can hold accountable for the harm you suffered, including:
- Primary care or emergency room physicians
- Pharmacists
- Radiologists
- Pathologists
- Surgeons
- Surgical techs
- Nurses
However, not all medical negligence occurs in the settings above. Other medical providers that you can take legal action against on behalf of injured, ill, or deceased clients include:
- Mental health counselors or therapists, including licensed clinical social workers, psychologists, and psychiatrists
- Chiropractors
- Dentists, periodontists, orthodontists, and oral surgeons
- Respiratory therapists
- Optometrists and ophthalmologists
- Other types of doctors
While doctors and emotional or behavioral therapists tend to carry their own malpractice insurance, which allows you to sue them directly for their negligent actions, nurses and other support personnel are typically covered by their employer’s policy.
This means that you’d name them as a defendant in your filing, though ultimately, the party responsible for paying a settlement will typically be the insurer for the medical center that employs them.
Understanding the Standard of Care Owed to Patients
The standard of care rule is at the heart of medical malpractice cases. Put simply, there’s a norm or standard protocol that doctors with similar training in a common geographic area follow in diagnosing or treating patients with certain conditions. That’s essentially what a “standard of care” is.
That standard also serves as the proverbial measuring stick for assessing whether your healthcare provider acted in a way that aligned or deviated from how a patient’s presenting concerns or procedure should have been handled.
If a lawyer determines that a healthcare provider took certain actions that deviated from standard protocol and that action or inaction caused a patient to experience declining health, illness, or injury, then they’re likely to advise their client that their claim is worth pursuing in civil court.
Compensation Available in Prince George’s County Medical Malpractice Cases
Just like any other personal injury case, you may be entitled to recover compensation for medical bills, lost wages, and non-economic damages like pain and suffering as a victim of physician and other medical errors.
Maryland law doesn’t cap how much you can recover in economic losses. That would include all the verifiable expenses such as follow-up surgeries to correct the issue, medication, physical therapy, and hospitalization stays.
However, there is a cap for noneconomic damages such as for pain and suffering, mental anguish, and loss of enjoyment of life. In Maryland, the current cap is at $950,000, and it increases by $15,000 every year. The cap for wrongful death is at $1,425,000.
How Long Does Maryland Allow You to Sue for Medical Negligence?
The length of time you have to file an insurance claim or file a lawsuit for medical malpractice is known as a statute of limitations. Maryland Courts and Judicial Proceedings Code Section 5-109 spells out the amount of time that our state allows victims to pursue legal action for this type of negligence:
- Five years from the onset of the injury
- Three years after the discovery of the injury
Whichever of the two dates above comes first is the statute of limitations applicable in a respective plaintiff’s case.
Medical Malpractice FAQs
Medical malpractice claims are especially complex and require the support of a skilled lawyer. GDH Law has helped many clients prevail in these types of cases. Our support begins with providing answers to all your questions, including the following frequently asked questions:
How do you prove a medical malpractice claim?
To prove a medical malpractice claim, you and your attorney need to establish the following four key elements:
- The medical professional owed a duty of care to the patient
- That duty of care was breached
- The injury was caused by the breach
- There were damages resulting from the breach
In order to prove those elements, you will need to gather all the relevant information, including medical records, doctor notes, and independent witness testimony.
What if I signed a waiver before my procedure?
Before you undergo any surgical procedure or treatment, you will be asked to sign a waiver. That waiver should inform you about what the procedure is all about, including the recovery and potential risks. However, signing that waiver does not absolve the medical professional or hospital facility from engaging in negligent acts.
In other words, the waiver does not give a doctor permission to provide substandard care.
How do I determine what my malpractice claim is worth?
You are entitled to seek all the economic and non-economic damages associated with the negligence that caused you harm.
In addition to the medical expenses, you can also ask for lost wages and future earning potential. The more severe your circumstances, the more you may be entitled to recover.
You’ll work closely with your attorney to take into account all of your losses.
Who can be sued for medical malpractice?
There may be many parties named as defendants in a malpractice case, starting with your lead doctor. The medical professionals and entities you can name include the following:
- Physician assistants
- Nurses
- Nurse aides
- Pharmacists
- Radiologists
- Anesthesiologists
- Surgical team
- Hospital
- EMT
- Urgent Care Clinic
- Chiropractor
- Physical therapist
- Psychologists
What if my doctor changes the records to avoid the lawsuit?
A doctor is obliged to carry malpractice insurance. If they are sued, that insurance will cover the damages. Altering records can lead to potential criminal charges, which isn’t something a doctor will want to face in addition to a malpractice claim. Also, there will be copies of the records that make it hard to alter.
Why Work With a GDH Law Medical Malpractice Lawyer?
Cases involving physician wrongdoing are notoriously complex. This is why many attorneys steer clear of handling cases involving healthcare provider errors because it can be challenging to pinpoint how their actions deviated from the norm.
However, as our attorneys are seasoned in handling these cases, we have a team of medical experts that we often consult with for guidance. This ensures that every potentially negligent party is held accountable for their actions.
By doing this, we do our part to ensure that patients who fall victim to preventable harm don’t have to live with both the physical and financial consequences of negligence.
Contact us today to discuss your case. Meeting with a College Park medical malpractice lawyer is completely free, and if you hire us, we only get paid if we recover a settlement on your behalf.
