New Trends in Medical Negligence
Trends in medical negligence law and litigation, including economic and social changes that impact the number of claims, changes in public perceptions, expanding concepts of liability, difficulties in determining responsibility for particular care decisions, systems errors, and telemedicine are outlined.
Submitting Claims to Hospital Districts
Strict claim-filing requirements must be followed before suing a government entity, including a hospital district. If all of the statutory requirements are not followed, the case may be dismissed. A case is outlined in which it was almost impossible to determine who to serve with a claim and how to do it. As a result of this case and article, the Washington legislature passed a new law requiring all hospital districts to name a registered agent for the purpose of serving claims.
Disclosures in Discovery: What’s Required from the Plaintiff?
This presentation outlines the court rules, appellate court rulings, and ethical rules that govern responses a plaintiff’s attorney must make to discovery requests, including interrogatories, by another party.
A Fatal Standard of Care for Heart Attack Victims?
Medical negligence and wrongful death cases involving a delay in diagnosis and treatment of cardiovascular disease often present a common fact pattern. This article outlines the standard of care in diagnosing cardiac disease and how it often fails to avoid poor outcomes. It also discusses the handling of legal claims from misdiagnosis of cardiac disease. Changes occurring after 1998 place much greater emphasis on using cardiac enzymes to rule out cardiac explanations for chest pain symptoms.
Ethical Considerations in Representation of Multiple Parties
This paper outlines the ethical issues involved in representing multiple parties injured in the same incident or parties that may have a conflict in terms of allocating damages. Examples include representing: 1. the estate’s representative as well as those who would be beneficiaries, 2. both husband and wife when one is injured and the spouse has a separate claim, and 3. parents and children in a claim of injury to the child.
Some Thoughts on Mediation
The costs of litigation and taking a case to trial are so great there is a new emphasis on alternative dispute resolution in personal injury cases. Although arbitrations are sometimes substituted for a jury trial, mediation is the preferred and more common means of resolving a claim without the need for a trial.
The Erosion of the ERISA Defense
This paper outlines legal defenses based on the federal Employee Retirement Income Security Act, how the act applies to medical negligence claims, and how court rulings have gradually eroded those defenses.
Which Defendants Do You Name in a Medical Negligence Case?
In determining which defendants to name in a medical negligence case, the least number of defendants that still allow the claimant to present a strong case is preferred.
R.S.D. and Sympathetically Maintained Pain
Reflex sympathy dystrophy, a painful and often disabling condition arising from disruption of the sympathetic nervous system, is often difficult to diagnose and treat. The term currently used is “complex regional pain syndrome.”
Mediation in Medical Negligence Cases
Mediation — a voluntary settlement meeting with an independent mediator – is an alternative in medical negligence cases.
