How To Know if Your Medical Malpractice Case Is Valid

If you were recently injured and suspect you might have a medical malpractice case on your hands, it can be incredibly difficult to know whether or not your case is valid. The best way to know for sure is to speak with a medical malpractice lawyer in Fort Lauderdale, FL. Most attorneys are more than happy to provide a free consultation, allowing you to learn the information you need. Even if it turns out you do not really have a valid case, you have not spent any money yet, so there is no harm. However, it may be helpful to have some idea how valid your case is in advance so you can save yourself some time in case your lawsuit is not really valid. This guide will explain everything you need to know.

Medical Malpractice

Medical malpractice is what it is called when a physician causes injuries to you with their actions or inactions. This may be a misdiagnosis that causes you harm, a medical procedure that went wrong, a mistake during surgery, being given the wrong prescription or injection, or any number of other things. For a case to be valid, two things must be true. First, the physician needs to fail to meet the standard of care that all physicians are held to. Second, this failure must be the direct result of your injury. This is, of course, only a simple overview. To get a more in-depth understanding, you need to know how negligence is legally defined.

Negligence

Medical negligence has four components. You will notice a similarity between these components and the two requirements listed above. They are:

• Duty – This is the standard of care that all physicians are held to
• Breach – This is when a physician fails to fulfill their duty
• Causation – This is when a failure to fulfill a duty causes an injury
• Damage – This is when a patient suffers an injury

To recap, for a medical malpractice case to be valid, a physician must breach the standard care that is exacted, this breach must cause an injury, and the injury must be significant. Each of these components must be proven one after another. They are designed so that each component builds upon the previous one. Of course, in a real court case, you will not have to worry about proving these components in this intricate manner. It will be your attorney who has to prove that. It is never a good idea to try to represent yourself.

Thanks to Needle & Ellenberg, P.A. for their insight into personal injury claims and valid medical malpractice cases.