Determining a Medical Malpractice Case

Answer:

People who come to see us with medical malpractice cases often want to know if they have a case. With the experience that we have had in medical malpractice cases, we go through three steps to evaluate that. One is liability, meaning did the damage happen, did the doctor, the hospital, the nursing staff engage in conduct that was negligent, or in the medical malpractice language, did it fall below the standard of care for that particular event? If that answer is yes, we go to step two. Step two is called causation. What that means is did the acts or inactions of the healthcare provider cause the injury? If you don’t have it, then there’s no case. If it did, then we go to step three. That is damages. Did the bad acts cause the damages we’re complaining about, the damages that we’re talking about with the client? That may sound obvious. Sometimes it’s not, though, in a complicated case.

Damages, unfortunately, have to be substantial. Malpractice cases are very expensive cases. Because the expenses come out of the client’s share of a recovery, the damages of the case have to be large enough, substantial enough, to support the case. The very last thing that we want to do is bring a case if there aren’t enough damages. We explain it fully with the client at the front end because the last thing we want to have happen at the end of the life of a case if that we get paid and our client does not. Our attorney fee percentage is off the gross recovery, meaning the expenses come out of the client’s recovery off the top and the client basically gets what’s left. If we’re getting the overwhelming majority of the case or we suspect that’s going to be the case, then we tell that client we cannot help.

There are other means of addressing the case through administrative complaints with the agency for healthcare administration and we go through those types of things, as well. We would not be able to handle a malpractice case unless the damages are substantial enough. If you have a case, whether the damages are great or maybe not so great, come call us so we can point you in the right direction. We could educate you about your case, and figure out a plan that suits you best.