Four Cases that Indicate You Need a Philadelphia Medical Malpractice Attorney on Your Side

A medical malpractice lawsuit can arise due to misdiagnosis, improper treatment, surgical errors, and other reasons. Thankfully, medical providers have malpractice insurance that protects them, their practice, and the hospital when mishaps or accidents take place during treatment. Because medical errors are a common cause of fatalities in Philadelphia, it is important to learn more about lawsuits based on medical malpractice. Also, patients must know when they should consult with a Philadelphia Medical Malpractice Attorney about a possible lawsuit. Here’s why hiring this kind of attorney may make sense:

Ineffective Treatment

If you are getting medical treatment from a doctor and you think it is not working for your specific needs, you should contact an attorney to discuss the possibility of filing a lawsuit. Ineffective treatment can result from misdiagnoses and the prescription of wrong medications. If your condition is misdiagnosed, you end up ingesting the wrong medication or undergoing unnecessary treatment that can jeopardize your health. Also, your condition will only progress as it remains undiagnosed and untreated. 

Misdiagnosis

If you have been diagnosed with a severe medical condition following a few laboratory tests, you must question your doctor. While blood and urine tests may provide signs of a serious condition such as heart disease, cancer, or kidney failure, your doctor must order more extensive tests before they come up with a diagnosis to avoid misdiagnosing your condition. A misdiagnosis means you get the wrong treatment while your condition continues to get worse. 

Surgical Errors

If your physician made an error during surgery, treatment, or procedure, you should consider filing a medical malpractice lawsuit against them. Common errors they can make include administering improper medication dosages, leaving surgical instruments inside your body, cutting an artery during surgery, doing surgery on the wrong body part, and others. Doctors who use unsterilized instruments that result in infections following surgery and those who provide patients with contaminated blood during transfusions deserve to be brought into a lawsuit. 

Different Second Opinion

After you get a serious diagnosis from a doctor, you must get a second opinion. The second opinion will minimize the risk of misdiagnosis as well as ensure you do not get ineffective and unnecessary treatment. Should you get a completely different opinion from another medical expert, you should consult with a lawyer. The different medical opinions can indicate one of the doctors fails to complete their job effectively. Also, this is a sign that you must consider getting a third opinion.