Damages for Medication Errors

Medical malpractice occurs when a health care provider harms a patient through professional negligence. While some medication errors are not actionable, others can constitute grounds for a medical malpractice claim. Medication errors can involve a wide range of actions that fall below the professional standard of care including the prescription and dispensation of the wrong medication, or a failure to note a serious interaction between a patient’s medications for different conditions. If you were harmed because of a medication error, you may be able to bring a medical malpractice lawsuit to recover your economic and noneconomic losses arising out of the mistake. You should consult the seasoned Syracuse medical malpractice lawyers of DeFrancisco & Falgiatano Personal Injury Attorneys about whether you have grounds to sue. We’ve helped clients achieve best results for medical malpractice and other types of lawsuits for more than 30 years.

In order to establish your entitlement to recover damages for medication errors, our Syracuse lawyers must prove: (1) you had a professional relationship with the defendant such that he or she owed you a professional standard of care, (2) he departed from the professional standard of care, (3) causation, and (4) damages. A medical professional must have agreed to treat you to be held accountable for medical malpractice.

In most cases, we will need to retain an expert to opine on what the professional standard of care was under the circumstances. This is determined by looking at what other reasonably competent health care providers in the same specialty and geographical region would have done. For example, if a reasonably competent neurologist in Upstate New York would not have prescribed two medications that interacted adversely, but yours did, and as a result your neurological condition was made worse, you may have grounds to sue for the medication error.

The extent of harm you suffer will determine what you can recover as the result of a medication error. Every patient’s case must be assessed by an experienced medical malpractice lawyer. Damages that may be recovered could be economic or noneconomic. These damages may be reduced by comparative negligence. When applying this doctrine, the jury will determine the total damages, but will also determine your comparative fault as a plaintiff to the defendant’s to determine your proportionate responsibility for your own harm. The total damages are then reduced by an amount equal to your percentage of fault. For example, if you failed to alert the doctor as to the correct medications you were taking when asked, and as a result your doctor prescribed something that had an interaction with an undisclosed medication, a jury may believe you bear some fault for your own injuries.

Economic damages arising out of medication errors may include medical bills, lost wages, replacement services, out-of-pocket costs, and other concrete losses. For example, if a nurse injected medication in the wrong location and as a result you were paralyzed, you may not be able to work in the same profession or at all, and in that case, you may be able to recover your lost or reduced wages.

Noneconomic losses for medication errors may include pain and suffering, loss of enjoyment, loss of consortium, and mental anguish. Every patient’s situation calls for a unique calculus of noneconomic damages. Even your choice of attorney can have a big impact on whether the jury sympathizes with you and to what extent it finds your story of losses plausible or natural, given what happened to you.

There are instances in which a medication error proves fatal. In that case, a family may be able to recover wrongful death damages, including medical bills incurred prior to death and funeral and burial expenses.

If you were harmed by medication errors, you should call the experienced Syracuse medical malpractice lawyers of DeFrancisco & Falgiatano Personal Injury Attorneys who have represented injured patients and their families for more than 30 years. We handle cases in Buffalo, Albany, Lowville, Rochester, Auburn, Watertown, Herkimer, Oswego, Wampsville, Canandaigua, Lyons, Ithaca, Cooperstown, Oneida, Utica, Binghamton, Elmira, and all of Upstate New York. For a free consultation, complete our online form or call us at 833-200-2000.