Understanding Your Rights to Medical Malpractice Compensation in New York
Medical malpractice can lead to various losses, including expensive medical bills, lost income and other damages, such as suffering and pain. A knowledgeable New York attorney can help you learn about your rights to a fair settlement.
First consider if your injuries resulted from a medical mistake. Then you can file the process of bringing a malpractice lawsuit.
Medical expenses
The most obvious cost associated with
malpractice lawyer is that of medical treatment required to treat the results of the injuries. It's important to understand that this type of damage is restricted by state law at a level established in a health care provider's liability insurance policy. Some states have also set up injured patient compensation funds in order to cover the perceived costs of litigation and help providers reduce their liability insurance premiums.
In addition to medical expenses, victims are entitled to compensation for other costs that are a result of negligence. These are referred to as economic or special damages. They cover the cost of any medical services (past and future) that are necessary to treat the injury that resulted from the malpractice, as well in any loss of income due to not being able to work because of the injury.
In medical malpractice cases, pain and damages are also common. The amount of damages for pain and suffering may differ greatly between claimants and is considered to be subjective. It covers any physical pain, emotional distress, and other non-physical effects due to the malpractice. For example an individual plaintiff could be compensated for a doctor's mistake that caused her to miss an important cancer screening appointment.
In addition, punitive damages are also possible in some cases. These are intended to punish a doctor for particularly egregious actions, like leaving a dirty sponge in the patient's body following surgery.
Suffering and pain
The pain and suffering category is an example of non-economic damages in medical malpractice cases. They cover the emotional and physical trauma that a victim suffered as a result of the doctor's negligence. The symptoms could be minor such as anxiety or discomfort or more serious symptoms, such as the loss of enjoyment and depression, embarrassment, insomnia, and fear.
It's difficult to establish an amount of money on suffering and pain, therefore jury instructions typically leave it up to the jurors to rely on their own judgment, background, and experience in determining what is fair and reasonable. Therefore, the amount of money paid in malpractice cases vary greatly.
Your medical malpractice attorney can help you demonstrate the extent of your pain using evidence that can be used to prove your case. Images and Xrays, along with home models, movies and diagrams will help jurors understand the extent of your injuries.
If a doctor's malpractice resulted in the death of a patient's family members, the heirs could be able to recover damages through the survival statutes, or wrongful death lawsuits. Laws governing wrongful deaths allow the spouse and children of a victim killed to receive the same amount of money they would have received had the patient survived. The amount that a victim can receive is usually restricted by the state's caps on pain and suffering. This is why it's so crucial to have a skilled medical
malpractice law firms attorney on your side to fight for the compensation you deserve.
Lost wages
You can get back your lost wages in the event that you miss work due to medical malpractice. This includes your base salary, bonuses, commissions and other benefits of employment. It also includes any pay raises or increases in pay. Your
attorney will review your pay stubs and previous pay statements to determine your average earnings prior to your injury, and then subtract the absence from work to calculate your total lost wages. Your attorney can also assist you in determining the future loss of earnings by using a present value calculation. This is a complicated analysis of financials that considers the impact of your injuries on your ability to work in the future. it's generally performed by a specialist hired by your attorney.
There is also the possibility of recovering economic damages, such as pain and suffering, caused by the error. The jury will determine the amount of compensation that is appropriate which may differ from case to case. However, some states have caps on these damages, and have been declared unconstitutional in several cases.
Settlements of seven figures tend to be associated with serious permanent injuries or wrongful death resulting from extreme healthcare negligence. For instance, surgical errors which result in amputations or birth defects that result in the brain of an infant and deaths, and anesthesia errors leading to comas may all warrant high-value settlements. In certain instances punitive damages could be offered to punish bad behavior.
Damages for future medical care
In a medical malpractice case there are two types of damages that a plaintiff may pursue: non-economic and economic damages. The former are based on calculable financial losses such as past and future medical expenses. The latter are more difficult to quantify and encompass pain and suffering, as well as loss of enjoyment of life. In a lawsuit involving medical malpractice the jury will have to hear expert testimony to evaluate these types of losses.
Past medical expenses are easy to prove by providing actual bills from the person who was injured's health healthcare providers. For future expenses, the attorney for the plaintiff will submit medical evidence that shows what treatments are likely to be required in the future and what the treatment will cost at present. The amount of future medical treatment needed can be affected by the victim's ages when they were injured.
Damages to future wages can be proven through demonstrating the impact of the injury on the patient's capacity to work and earn in the future. This can be proved by expert witness testimony or by examining similar cases in the past.
Pain and suffering is a umbrella term that covers the physical and mental distress and discomfort which patients suffer because of medical negligence. This type of damage is usually based on the testimony of the victim and witnesses as well as evidence such as photos of videotapes and written reports.