West Palm Beach Medical Malpractice Lawyer

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Don’t let a doctor or other healthcare professional get away with not taking your health seriously. Find out if you can get compensated for your injuries and losses. Speak with a medical malpractice lawyer from West Palm Beach.

When you need medical care, you trust your healthcare provider to put your well-being first. When providers fail in this trust and medical negligence occurs, people get hurt, fall ill, or see their health decline further. When this happens, you may have grounds for a medical malpractice case.

Even if the fault is blatant, you can’t expect the negligent healthcare provider to just accept responsibility. That sort of publicity is bad for their business. Their malpractice insurer also won’t be eager to settle with you and risk their profit margins.

The Law Offices of Casey D. Shomo is here to guide you through the legal process to the settlement you deserve. Our West Palm Beach medical malpractice lawyer has in-depth experience with malpractice cases.

What Is Medical Malpractice?

So you went to the doctor and your health got worse. That doesn’t necessarily mean your case is one of medical malpractice. For malpractice, some form of negligence must have been present. To prove medical negligence, certain elements must be demonstrated in your West Palm Beach case.

The first element of medical malpractice to prove is that a doctor-patient relationship actually existed. This means the doctor had a duty of care.

The second element of malpractice is breach of duty. Essentially, you must prove the medical professional you were seeing provided you with less-than-standard care. The basic way to prove this is for other medical providers to agree they would not have acted in the same manner under the same conditions.

Next, you must prove the poor treatment you received was the direct cause of your medical injury. All outside factors that could have contributed to an injury or illness must be eliminated.

Finally, you must have suffered real damages or harm that the insurance companies or the court can remedy.

According to Florida’s statute of limitations, there is a blanket deadline of four years from which the event of malpractice occurred. However, you must have filed a claim within two years of when you discovered the injury, or within two years from when you should have reasonably discovered the negligence that resulted in injury.

If a minor under 8 years old was involved in the alleged medical malpractice incident, Florida law states that the case must be filed before the child’s eighth birthday.

If medical professionals or an organization attempts to conceal the harm caused by medical malpractice, or falsify facts in the case, the period for filing the case may be extended to the victim by two years from the time the incident was discovered by the plaintiff. There’s a deadline on this rule of seven years from the time of the incident.

Types of Medical Malpractice in West Palm Beach

Doctors, nurses, hospitals, surgeons, dentists, pharmacists, and chiropractors are just a few of the medical professionals who can cause you an injury. If you’ve been hurt, you may qualify for compensation. Medical malpractice lawyers in West Palm Beach can help.

Here are some common types of medical injury cases in West Palm Beach:

  • Failure to Diagnose and Misdiagnosis Sometimes, doctors make bad assumptions about what their patients tell them. Or, they may not pay close attention and miss vital info. This can lead to a treatable condition progressing further than it should have or the wrong treatment being prescribed.
  • Surgical Errors – These cases can be some of the worst for victims. From performing the wrong operation to leaving a foreign object within the site, a surgical error can have long-lasting consequences for your health.
  • Dental Malpractice A dentist can make any number of errors that could cost you one or more of your teeth, possibly even leaving you disfigured. In some cases, anesthesia errors have resulted in the wrongful death of dental patients.
  • Birth Injuries – If the mother or the newborn was injured during birth, it can change the course of the new family’s future. It is your right to seek damages from those who have harmed you or your baby through negligence.
  • Prescription Drug Errors – Both your pharmacist and prescribing physician must ensure any drugs you are prescribed won’t negatively interact with each other. In addition, your doctor has a duty to check your medical history to be sure you aren’t given medication you’re allergic to.

Types of Medical Malpractice Damages

There are two different types of damages you can seek compensation for after being harmed by malpractice. They are financial expenses and non-economic damages.

Economic Damages for Malpractice

You can seek compensation for all of the financial losses you’ve experienced because of the physician’s error. This includes current and future medical bills, lost income, therapy and medication costs, mobility equipment, and anything else with a direct dollar value.

Non-Economic Damages for Medical Malpractice

Non-economic losses are related to how this injury has changed your life. You can be compensated for how this experience has impacted you. Some examples of non-economic damages may include:

  • Anxiety
  • Loss of enjoyment of life
  • Difficulties with sleeping
  • Chronic pain
  • Depression

Though previous Florida law dictated a cap on non-economic damages, this has since been overturned.

Discuss the details of your case with medical malpractice lawyers in West Palm Beach.

What the Medical Malpractice Process May Look Like

Before filing a medical malpractice case, make sure you have a trusted West Palm Beach malpractice attorney on your side to guide you along the way. Our team will work with you to begin an investigation into your medical malpractice case. We will be able to aid you in finding the details you may have previously overlooked.

We will want to speak with the victim and their family when first starting our journey together. This will help us to understand what you or your loved one went through. Then, we will be able to gather details to help you. After speaking with everyone, your lawyer will gather the medical records of the victim. This will help us to prove dates and times of incidents and when they happened, as well as when pain may have occurred.

Without medical records, it’s impossible to prove you were hurt by the medical professional or how your injuries occurred. The more evidence you can provide us with, the better chance we have of helping you! Though seemingly simple, it may be difficult to obtain the victim’s medical records. With our team on your side, we can go through the legal hurdles to obtaining the proper records and evidence together.

Once we have obtained your records, we may need to reach out to a medical professional. This professional will have no ties to your case, but will be able to provide an expert’s point of view on the incident and what likely occurred. This will be a key testimony for your case. In some circumstances, we may want to speak with more than one medical professional. If the medical professional can prove, or provide enough evidence, to further your case, your lawyer will be ready to help you file your claim.

In Florida, once a medical malpractice claim is filed, your cases will enter into what is called a pre-suit. This is a 90-day period in which the medical professional or organization who is the defendant in this case can conduct its own investigation. This investigation is supposed to be in good faith, which means they should properly conduct an investigation into the standard of care during the incident.

However, once the investigation has taken place, the defendant can choose to deny the claim of the victim, do nothing and let the case continue to court, or try to settle the case outside of court with a monetary offer. During this process, you will want to make sure you have a medical malpractice attorney with the Law Offices of Casey D. Shomo on your side. We will be able to provide you with guidance during this step, as well as answer any questions you may have.

Get Help from a Medical Malpractice Attorney in West Palm Beach, FL

It’s often unclear if malpractice has occurred. The responsible party isn’t going to help you figure it out. But we can. Need to find out if you can seek compensation for harm you suffered because of a healthcare provider’s negligence? Discuss your case with a West Palm Beach medical malpractice lawyer from the Law Offices of Casey D. Shomo during a free consultation.

To arrange a time for your consult with our law firm, complete the contact form on this page or give us a call at 561-659-6366. There’s never an obligation to proceed, so there’s zero risk involved in discovering how we can help you seek the settlement you need.

West Palm Beach Medical Malpractice FAQ

After having your trust betrayed by a doctor or other practitioner, you’re unsure what to do next. This is perfectly normal and understandable. We’ve answered a few questions here. For more in-depth information, please contact our West Palm Beach law firm to consult with a medical malpractice lawyer.

How much time do I have to file a medical malpractice claim in Florida?

Florida has a statute of limitations of just two years for medical malpractice claims. If you wait to file until after two years have passed, you lose your right to compensation and your case will be dismissed without being heard.  

What is informed consent, and what does it mean to my medical malpractice case?

Healthcare providers are required to inform you of any risks and possible side effects involved in a certain treatment course. If your doctor doesn't discuss this with you and you are hurt as a result of the treatment, your case might qualify as medical malpractice.

Will I have to attend court for my West Palm Beach medical malpractice case?

Not usually. In most personal injury cases, including medical malpractice, your attorney can settle the case outside of the courtroom. How do we do this? We will negotiate with the medical provider or their insurance company. Only if the other side refuses to pay you fairly will we need to enter the courtroom.

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