Stone Mountain Hospital Negligence Lawyer

Stone Mountain Hospital Negligence Attorney

If you put your trust in a hospital to treat you with skill and care, you shouldn’t be made to suffer because of negligence. Unfortunately, mistakes happen when doctors and medical providers fail to follow accepted standards of care. If you were harmed by medical mistakes, you might be able to pursue financial compensation with the help of a Stone Mountain hospital negligence lawyer.

If you received negligent care at a hospital serving patients in Stone Mountain, Georgia, you may be able to pursue legal action against the negligent hospital with the help of our Stone Mountain medical malpractice lawyer. Some nearby hospitals include Emory Decatur Hospital, Piedmont Eastside Medical Center, and Northside Hospital Gwinnett.

About The Tolson Firm, LLC

At our Atlanta-based law firm, we are dedicated to helping those injured by medical malpractice. Audrey M. Tolson and the team at the Tolson Firm, LLC, can provide you with compassionate legal counsel for you and your family.

Audrey was recently named one of “Most Powerful and Influential Female Lawyers” by the magazine Women Looking Ahead. As a Black attorney who is passionate about giving back to her community, Tolson understands how it feels to be victimized by another party. She and her team are committed to helping clients seek the justice they deserve by pursuing compensation from those who caused their injury.

What Is Hospital Negligence?

Hospital negligence refers to when a hospital and/or its employees cause harm to a patient by failing to adhere to an accepted medical standard of care. Hospital negligence can include administrative policies that lead to patient injury, as well as the actions of individual medical workers.

Hospitals have a duty to provide safe, dependable care to their patients. When they fail to do so, patients can be seriously injured by:

• Medical complications
• Death
• Lengthy illnesses

Hospital negligence differs from negligence on the part of a single doctor. While a doctor can be negligent during your care, hospital negligence may include mistakes on the part of administrators and policies that lead to injury.

For example, if a hospital is not properly staffed or has poorly trained nurses and doctors, patients can be seriously harmed by the mistake of any one individual that arises from a system-wide problem, resulting in hospital negligence penalties.

Relevant Laws

In Georgia, medical malpractice and hospital negligence cases are ruled by a few different laws. Georgia Code § 9-3-71 states that there is a two-year statute of limitations for most medical malpractice claims. Essentially, this means that Georgia patients have two years from the date of injury to file a claim.

Georgia Code § 51-1-27 states that medical care providers must exercise “reasonable care and skill” in order to avoid injuries to their patients. Like many states, Georgia also requires professional medical testimony to establish a legal standard of care and prove how medical negligence occurred. Hospital negligence can be challenging to prove. Medical records, professional testimony, and extensive investigation are often involved in these cases.

How Hospital Negligence Happens

Medical negligence can occur in many ways. Hospitals are busy environments with many different kinds of professionals coming and going to care for you. When safety protocols are not being followed or when someone fails to do their part, mistakes can happen. Negligence can occur due to the following medical negligence examples in Georgia hospitals:

• Hospital staff being overworked or understaffed
• Nurses and technicians not being properly trained
• Medical residents not being properly supervised
• Miscommunication between medical professionals
• A lack of adherence to proper hospital safety procedures

Administrators can be negligent as well if they do not have policies in place to prevent medical mistakes. In the United States, according to one source, out of 130 million ED visits annually, 7.4 million (5.7%) patients receive a false diagnosis, 2.6 million (2.0%) experience an adverse event, and roughly 370,000 (0.3%) experience major consequences, such as death or significant disability.

Hire a Hospital Negligence Lawyer

If you think that a hospital was negligent during your care, you should hire a hospital negligence lawyer. Medical malpractice cases can be tough, especially when going up against large hospital corporations and insurance companies.

A medical malpractice lawyer in Stone Mountain, Georgia can gather all of your medical records and speak to professionals who can review your records to determine if negligence was present. Your attorney can also determine who might be liable for your injuries. Doctors, nurses, hospital staff, and hospital administrators can all be held responsible for medical negligence.

FAQs

How Hard Is It to Prove Negligence?

Establishing medical negligence can sometimes be difficult. You have the burden of proof. This means you must prove that a medical provider breached the acceptable standard of care and caused your injury to occur. Medical records, professional witnesses, and substantive proof will likely be required. For this reason, many patients choose to partner with a seasoned medical malpractice attorney.

What Are the Four Things That Must Be Proven in a Medical Malpractice Claim?

Typically, four elements are required to prevail on a medical malpractice claim: duty, breach, causation, and damages. Duty and breach together mean that the provider was required to use a certain standard of care when treating the patient and failed to do so. Causation means that the breach caused the injury. Damages means that the patient was harmed and suffered a loss that can be calculated, like medical bills or pain and suffering.

Can You File a Claim Against a Hospital for Negligence?

Yes, patients may file a claim against a hospital if it was negligent in some way and caused injury to a patient. This includes negligence on the part of the hospital’s nurses, technicians, and other staff. It can also include problems with the hospital itself, such as understaffing, failure to properly train employees, or allowing unsafe policies or procedures. Hospitals may also be partially responsible for the errors of physicians who practice in the hospital.

What Is Considered Neglect in a Hospital?

Hospital neglect occurs when a patient does not receive adequate care, attention, or treatment that they should be given. It can involve disregarding symptoms patients are reporting, failure to properly check vitals, delaying treatment that should be started immediately, or not responding to patient calls for help. Insufficient hygiene, medication errors, and understaffing that result in otherwise avoidable injuries can also fall under hospital neglect.

Contact The Tolson Firm, LLC

If you believe your damages are a result of hospital negligence, The Tolson Firm, LLC, can help you in your case. Contact us today for a consultation.