Medical Malpractice

Medical malpractice is one of the major causes of deaths and medical problems of the present day in the field of medical care. According to the Zhan and Miller study, which supported the 1999 report conclusion of the Institute of Medicine (IOM), deaths caused by medical negligence should be seen as a national epidemic. Health care providers all over the world are contributing a pretty good part of their time to medical negligence resulting in many healthy people ending up with more medical problems in many cases and a few ending up in caskets.

Medical negligence and medical care providers are almost two sides of the same coin. In 2006 a follow up of the 1999 report of the Institute of Medicine was initiated to verify the soundness of the report. According to the 2006 study, a minimum of one and a half million people every year are harmed due to common medical malpractices. Medical negligence is quite common these days even though there have been vast improvements in the field of medicine.

Even after seeing the number of medical negligence lawsuits piling up in courthouses all over the United States, medical care professionals are still making mistakes costing people their health and in many cases their lives as well. Medical negligence is being dealt with strongly because of the ever-rising number of deaths in hospitals, which could have been avoided if the medical care provider had been more careful. In this present age of medical innovations millions of dollars are being handed out as compensation to the patient, in this case, the plaintiff or a legal appointed executor in the case of a wrongful death.

Compensatory and punitive damages in the case of a medical malpractice law suit could go all the way up to millions of dollars depending on the type of medical negligence. Compensatory damages can be both economic and non-economic. Economic damages are merely financial losses. Non-economic damages are the physical and psychological damages caused by the medical care professional. Punitive damages are given only in cases of wreckless conduct by the medical care provider. Either way medical negligence is quite common even though it costs the medical care providers a pretty penny.

According to insurance companies and doctors, medical negligence litigations have been growing in leaps and bounds with every passing year. In the United States, the number of doctors going out of business and moving from one state to another is increasing rapidly due to the number of medical negligence suits filed against them. According to a study of medical malpractice claims in the United States of America in 2004, the total number of errors and deaths due to errors made by medical care professionals was of staggering proportions. Presently in the United States a minimum of two hundred thousand deaths every year are due to medical malpractice.