Medical errors are not as uncommon in the U.S. as some people might like to believe. Unfortunately, when medical professionals do make serious mistakes, Illinois patients are not left unscathed. These mistakes can happen at any clinic, nursing home or hospital where medical professionals fail to put their patients’ health and needs first at all times.
Medical malpractice cases oftentimes involve the injury or death of a patient caused by a doctor’s obvious act of negligence such as removing the wrong infected organ during surgery or prescribing a medication without checking to see if the patient was allergic to the medicine. But doctors can also make serious or fatal mistakes even when they think they have taken every safety precaution when treating or operating on a patient. Under these circumstances, it is just as important that doctors are held liable for their medical or surgical errors so that patients and their families can receive the compensation they need to cover additional medical expenses resulting from the error.
After undergoing a routine procedure at an Illinois hospital to check for gall stones in February 2010, the doctors who performed the operation accidentally pierced the patient’s small intestine with a surgical instrument. Patients do face a number of risks whenever they undergo surgery, but many of these risks can also be prevented when the operations are performed correctly and when patients are monitored properly during procedures.
Last month, the patient filed a lawsuit against the two doctors who performed the routine surgery as well as the Illinois hospital where the surgery took place citing negligence in the incident. The victim of the surgical error is seeking compensation to help cover medical expenses and other damages resulting from the incident.
Although doctors may be experienced with performing routine surgeries, any slight error could cause serious or permanent injury to a patient. If the mistake is not caught or treated in time, a patient could also develop an infection from a pierced or punctured organ and suffer further health complications.
Source: The Madison St. Clair Record, “Pierced gallbladder leads to suit against doctors and Memorial,” Andrea Dearden, Feb. 27, 2012