Health Rights and Responsibilities
Professor Lori Janello
HSM 320
Professional Liability
Jacqueline Carothers
Medical malpractice occurs when “a doctor or medical professional did not practice the standard of care as dictated by their profession causing temporary or permanent damage to a patient.” Malpractice (aka liability) insurance is essentially what covers a physician or health care worker should they be sued by a patient for medical malpractice.
Professional Liability relieves you from the financial burden of defending yourself in a malpractice lawsuit. Professional liability insurance provides protection liabilities that could arise from the practice of your profession.
Professional misconduct or demonstration of an unreasonable lack of skill with the result of injury, loss, or damage to the patient is considered malpractice. Healthcare professionals are expected to use “reasonable skill” when providing care and treatment to patients. This means that not all Physicians or Healthcare professionals will perform an action in exactly the same way, as each person’s skill level will vary by small amounts.
Unreasonable amount of skill is unacceptable, since it demonstrates that a person does not have the required skills or is simply being careless which can lead to medical malpractice.
A patient can file a complaint if he or she does ot feel satisfied with your services As a healthcare professional one must provide standard care to their patients and if patients are dissatisfied with your services it can lead to become a huge problem. When a person sues they usually sue the employer and every medical employee involved with the situation. It can take years to litigate however you may be exonerated from liability, but your attorney fees can be extremely high.
In September 2012 a woman filed a lawsuit against a Gynecologist who practice Gynecology and Obstetrics’ for over thirty years. Patient came in to meet with the doctor for a follow up visit with concerns of using some type of birth control. There are many different types of birth control however patient inquire about the Intrauterine device also known as the IUD. It has been noted that several women experience discomfort and pain with the device implanted however the FDA approved the device in the year 2000.
In 2006 Patient had IUD device implanted to prevent pregnancy, despite the implanted IUD patient found out in the year 2007 that she had developed a left ectopic pregnancy patient had to undergo several procedures none of the procedures consist of imaging or radiology, during this time the doctor was unable to locate the IUD. Due to the doctor not being able to locate the device patient continued to experience discomfort and pain despite the fact patient had several complaints about the discomfort the doctor brushed her off and informed the patient she just might be ovulating and prescribe her with some pain medication. The Doctor didn’t take the patients concerns into consideration and remained unsympathetic and look further into why patient was experiencing so much pain.
Due to the excruciating pain the patient was experiencing, it became so unbearable, patient had to be rushed to the emergency room. A CAT scan was done and it was determined that the IUD device was floating around in her abdomen, finally patient had IUD removed.
