Philadelphia Medical Malpractice Lawyer
Medical Malpractice Lawyers in Philadelphia • Birth Injury Attorney • Wrongful Death Attorneys
Medical malpractice is a legal term referring to the result of a healthcare provider’s failure to provide the expected standard of care to a patient. The expected standard of care means that a healthcare provider must use the same degree of skill and learning, under the same or similar circumstances, that are used by other members of the medical profession. Unfortunately, some doctors cause harm through their mistakes, ignorance, negligence, lack of skill and misdiagnosis.
Specific specialty areas of our Medical Malpractice Law Firm: Wrongful Death Law, Medication Errors Law, Birth Defects and Birth Injury Law, Hospital Malpractice Law, Medical Misdiagnosis Law. We handle these cases and more.
Determining if you have a potential legal case for medical negligence or malpractice is difficult, at best. One sign that you may have a potential case would be an unexpected or very different result from a surgery or medical treatment.
Additionally, death or severe injury that occurs as a result of "routine" treatments or surgeries where the physician or doctor can give no reasonable explanation for the death or worsened condition of the patient, may give cause to consider that medical malpractice may have occurred.
If your attorney is able prove your medical malpractice case and the medical provider is found negligent, then you are entitled to recover “damages.” Damages are intended to help you return to the condition you were in prior to the injury.
Medical Malpractice Attorney Available 24 hours a day, seven days a week!
At The Law Firm of Jeffrey Harlan Penneys, Esq., we relentlessly pursue compensation for our clients injured by medical malpractice or medical negligence. Our success is based on years of experience litigating all types of personal injury and wrongful death claims. Our objective is justice for injured people.
Healthcare professionals are only required to give a standard of care that is ordinary or normal. A physician can be negligent in a variety of ways. Medical malpractice occurs through failure or errors in timely diagnosis, ordering appropriate treatment, ordering necessary tests and proper medication, consulting with specialists, and surgical procedures, among other things.
There are many different ways you can be seriously injured as a result of medical malpractice. The following are several of the ways an individual can die due to medical malpractice:
- Surgical Malpractice
- Pharmaceutical Errors
- Bacterial Infections
- Diagnosis Error
- Wrong Site Surgery
- Gastric Bypass Errors
- Breast Implant Malpractice
- Emergency Room Errors
- Delivery Room Negligence
- Elder Abuse / Nursing Home Neglect
It is an attorney's obligation to determine as quickly and efficiently as possible whether there is a good, actionable case. Medical malpractice cases are by their very nature complex, expensive to pursue, have a high risk of no recovery, and often involve a client's "personal" attachment.
Did you Know that you still have legal rights even if you signed a consent form?
A consent form does not give the health care provider a license to commit malpractice. While the execution of a typical consent form indicates acknowledgement of stated risks and complications associated with a given treatment or procedure, it does not relieve the health care provider from his or her duty of meeting the standard of care associated with such treatment or procedure.
In Pennsylvania, medical malpractice actions must be commenced within two years of the act or omission giving rise to the injury, or within two years of the date of discovery, to a maximum of four years following the date of the act or omission. Medical malpractice actions for objects left inside the body may be commenced within 2 years of the date of discovery. Under Pennsylvania law, a minor must file suit within 2 years of the victims18th birthday.
Several forms of damages are recoverable in a medical malpractice award – economic (for lost wages or medical expenses), non-economic (for pain and suffering), or punitive (to punish reckless behavior) damages. You may also receive malpractice compensation for future medical expenses and loss of future earnings. Punitive damages occur only in rare cases when it is proven that the medical practitioner had malicious intent.
If you, or someone you love, have depended on the care of a health care professional who misdiagnosed your medical condition, prescribed the wrong medication, or caused harm while treating you, contact me today.
Call Jeffrey Harlan Penneys at my Philadelphia medical malpractice lawyer office. I'll schedule a time to visit with you, at my office, in your home, or in your hospital room. Medical malpractice is everyone's concern.
Medical Error Statistics
The U.S. Institute of Medicine (IOM) released a report estimating that as many as 98,000 patients die each year as a result of medical errors in hospitals.
Compound this number with the unreported mistakes made in other healthcare settings (physicians’ offices, urgent care centers, nursing homes, pharmacies and home care) and the magnitude of medical malpractice becomes staggering.
In addition to the high costs of medical mistakes in terms of people’s lives and quality of life, our nation pays an estimated $17 billion per year in costs due to preventable errors.