Medical professionals are tasked with the vital task of ensuring their patients’ health, and this requires a great deal of competence and accuracy on their part. However, negligence has often come in the way of this, resulting in medical malpractice issues for the patients.
When this happens, the patient is advised to seek justice by filing a malpractice claim. However, the claim has to be pristine to qualify. Here are five secrets to a successful claim.
- Seek a Second Opinion
Determining whether malpractice has occurred requires deep medical knowledge and experience that a majority of patients do not have. As such, it is necessary to seek the opinion of a qualified and experienced physician in the same field as your current doctor. Provide your new physician with all information and documents about your illness, diagnosis, and treatment to facilitate proper following up of the case.
Be sure to state your intent as the consulting doctor may be required to appear before the court for testimony presentation purposes.
- Provide Proof of a Doctor-Patient Relationship
Proving that there is a doctor-patient relationship between you and your doctor is quite easy, but it may become difficult in some circumstances. This is especially common when working with quacks or unlicensed doctors. This is why it is always recommended to solicit the services of a licensed and certified physician as it often helps to prevent cases of malpractice in the first place.
- Provide Proof of Negligence
This is where the consulting doctor comes to play. There is a standard requirement among physicians dubbed the Medical Standard of Care. All doctors of a sound and reasonable mind and proper qualifications should meet this standard. To provide proof that this standard was not met – hence qualifying as medical negligence – you have to provide reports from your consulting doctor – this also often requires a personal testimony from the doctor.
- Show the Consequences of the Said Negligence
Medical malpractice may worsen the condition you are currently suffering from or bring up new ailments. The patient ends up suffering unnecessarily or even drying owing to the doctor’s negligence. It is this unnecessary suffering that is at the core of the malpractice claim, and justice and compensation depend on the scale of suffering. As such, it is also important to provide proof of related medical issues – these should also be provided by the consulting doctor and should be backed up by other medical professionals in relevant fields.
- Lawyer Up!
Medical malpractice claims are often complicated owing to the sensitivity of the underlying issues. On one hand, it demands medical knowledge and experience to prove negligence as well as the harm done as a result of the negligence. On the other hand, it requires legal knowledge as well as experience with such matters. As such, it becomes necessary to solicit the services of a medical negligence lawyer – this is not only crucial to determining whether or not your claim will be successful but also the value of justice and/or compensation.