South Florida medical malpractice attorney

Not only does medical malpractice lead to physical misery, but it can also result in profound emotional trauma, added medical costs, and many other issues. If you believe your doctor or other medical professional made a negligent error that resulted in your injury, please get in touch with a South Florida medical malpractice lawyer immediately.

Our skilled South Florida personal injury lawyers can help you obtain the compensation you deserve, which can provide financial stability so you can focus on recovery. Speak with our team by contacting us online or calling (561) 655-1990 for a free consultation.

What steps should you take after experiencing malpractice?

If you have any reason to believe you’ve been harmed by medical malpractice, try to keep the following in mind. These steps will help you protect your health and improve your chances of obtaining compensation.

1. Switch providers by asking for a referral

You definitely don’t want to run the risk of suffering further harm from the same medical professional. You have the right to get a referral so you can see another doctor. The physician who has been providing your care may have to be the one to give that referral, depending on the kind of doctor who was treating you or the type of insurance policy you have.

2. Obtain a copy of your medical records

You also have a legal right to get all of your medical records. Your South Florida medical malpractice lawyer can use these records as evidence that malpractice occurred.

The State of Florida doesn’t specify exactly how long a doctor has to release a patient’s records. However, most doctors follow HIPAA Privacy Rule guidelines, which require doctors to provide records within 30 days of a patient’s request.

3. Meet with a South Florida medical malpractice lawyer

Speaking with a skilled South Florida personal injury lawyer with Lytal, Reiter, Smith, Ivey & Fronrath can help increase your chances of obtaining fair compensation. We’ll clearly spell out all of your options and determine the strength of your case. If you hire us, we’ll launch an investigation into what happened.

4. Report the incident to the appropriate Licensing Board

You want to make sure the medical professionals (or professionals) who caused you harm are forced to face accountability for their negligence. In addition to taking legal action, you can report them to the appropriate licensing board.

5. Manage your condition carefully

You’ll want to do everything possible to help minimize whatever harm you’ve experienced. One way to do this is to monitor the way you feel closely. Talk to another doctor and follow their recommendations. If you notice any change in your condition, report it immediately.

What are common types of medical malpractice?

If your healthcare provider failed in their duty to uphold the established standard of care, and that failure caused harm, you can potentially sue for medical malpractice. Here are just a few of the malpractice cases we handle at Lytal, Reiter, Smith, Ivey & Fronrath.

Misdiagnosis

Your doctor may have diagnosed you with a minor condition when you actually had something much worse; this could be grounds for a medical malpractice lawsuit. However, you should know that not every instance of misdiagnosis is automatically malpractice. Your attorney will evaluate your situation and let you know if you have a case.

Delayed diagnosis

Your medical provider may have failed to read the results of diagnostic tests accurately or didn’t recognize the signs of a condition soon enough. Delayed diagnosis can also result from a failure to order testing or failing to refer a patient to a specialist before a condition worsens.

Negligent failure to treat

All doctors have the legal duty to treat a condition appropriately. When they don’t, they could face a medical malpractice lawsuit. Your doctor may have committed malpractice by failing to recognize a condition and failing to treat it.

Surgical malpractice

There are a lot of ways surgical malpractice can occur. Surgeons will sometimes leave tools in a patient’s body or operate on the wrong part of the body. There have even been incidents where a doctor operates on the wrong person entirely.

Birth injuries

Birth injuries are especially tragic, robbing a baby of their quality of life or seriously harming both the mother and child. If any mistake occurs during pregnancy, while the mother is in labor, or during the delivery of the child, the doctor could be found to have committed medical malpractice.

Improper follow-up/aftercare

Doctors can also commit malpractice by failing to meet the standard of care for follow-up treatment. They may fail to schedule tests or appointments after surgery or fail to monitor a patient after treatment properly. Medical personnel can forget to provide post-surgery instructions or fail to recognize potentially adverse reactions or complications.

Malpractice cases have special deadlines. Make sure you file your claim in time.

You have to file a medical malpractice lawsuit within two years of the date the incident occurred or within two years of when you discovered you’ve suffered harm. There are some instances where the deadline, or statute of limitations, can be extended to four years. Other exceptions involving children and fraud also exist.

Your South Florida medical malpractice lawyer can give you precise information on how long you have to take legal action. Even though you may have years to file a lawsuit, you should actually do so as soon as you can. The reason is your lawyer will need to gather evidence to support your claim. The longer it takes to start an investigation, the more likely it will be that key evidence will vanish.

What are the potential damages to claim?

If you file a medical malpractice lawsuit, you’ll be seeking to recover financial losses or damages. Examples of damages are covered below.

Economic damages

Economic damages can be easily traced using receipts, bills, or invoices. You should keep these documents as evidence of your medical expenses, lost wages, and other losses that you endured as a direct result of the incident.

Non-economic damages

On the other hand, you may have experienced severe emotional distress, as well as pain and suffering. You may not be able to pursue the activities you once loved, so you’re experiencing a loss of quality of life as well. These are all examples of non-economic or subjective damages. It takes a skilled South Florida medical malpractice lawyer to prove them.

We’ll work to obtain the maximum compensation.

When you choose Lytal, Reiter, Smith, Ivey & Fronrath, you’ll be working with a seasoned lawyer who will do everything possible to help you get every dollar you deserve. Even though malpractice cases involve formidable insurance companies, we have a long track record of defeating them. When they find out our firm represents you, there’s a good chance they’ll make a fair settlement offer. They’d rather do that than risk losing to us in court.

Can multiple parties be liable for your injury?

Medical malpractice cases can be extremely complex because there could be more than one party that played a role in harming you. These are just a few examples of the potentially liable parties in your case:

• Doctors can make surgical errors, commit misdiagnoses, or fail to monitor the condition of a patient after a procedure accurately.

• Nurses sometimes administer the wrong dosage of medication or give the wrong medicine entirely. They also sometimes fail to document a patient’s care correctly or improperly monitor a patient’s condition.

• Anesthesiologists commit malpractice when they fail to notice complications that can develop while a patient is under anesthesia.

• Physician’s assistants can contribute to a delay in care or a misdiagnosis by failing to communicate essential information to other members of a patient’s medical team.

• Pharmacists are sometimes liable for malpractice when they don’t properly advise patients about medication or fail to recognize potentially harmful drug interactions.

• The distributors and manufacturers of medical devices can harm patients when the devices are defective.

• Hospitals can be held liable for malpractice for failing to vet the doctors who practice in the facility properly.

How can our attorneys prove malpractice?

If you’re going to have the best chance of obtaining compensation, your South Florida medical malpractice lawyer is going to need to investigate the incident.

As stated earlier, this investigation needs to begin as quickly as possible, or critical evidence could disappear. We’ll look at the notes compiled by the doctor and your medical records. We’ll also speak to witnesses and seek opinions from medical experts.

What’s the cost of hiring a South Florida medical malpractice lawyer?

Hiring Lytal, Reiter, Smith, Ivey, and Fronrath will cost you nothing. We won’t receive any money unless we’re successful and you obtain the compensation you have coming.

Our South Florida medical malpractice lawyers are here to help

If you would like to schedule a free evaluation of your case, please contact Lytal, Reiter, Smith, Ivey & Fronrath online or call (561) 655-1990.