The moment medical staff removed what looked like a routine IV line, Josh Dziedzic, collapsed in his chair and slipped into a coma. The 25-year-old patient never regained consciousness and, after a long procession of family and friends paid their last respects, he was taken off life support.
Doctors at Palm West Hospital said his death was “natural” following complications from an opioid overdose, but an autopsy revealed otherwise. Now, the family of Josh Dziedzic is suing the Loxahatchee, Fla.- based hospital for allegedly concealing a medical error that led to his death.
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Emergency Room Quality of Care
Despite the best intentions to improve the quality of care and make patient safety a priority, visiting a doctor can still be a risky business. Each year, around 250,000 American lose their lives because of medical errors. If those numbers from a Johns Hopkins study are to be believed, medical errors will rank as the third-leading cause of death in the United States, behind only heart disease and cancer. And why shouldn’t those numbers hold up, the researchers believe fatalities due to the medical error may be even higher when residential and nursing home deaths are added into the equation.
That’s pretty scary. But, since when is a trip to the emergency room to treat a heart attack or bone fracture not the reason for alarm. What’s even more frightening is that 5 percent to 10 percent of all emergency room visits are subject to medical errors. That adds up to roughly 5-10 million mistakes for more than 140 million visits to U.S. hospitals.
Find an emergency room that isn’t overcrowded. These busy environments are particularly perilous to medical errors. Physicians and nurses are always fending off frequent interruptions to make rapid decisions based on limited and unreliable clinical information to treat intensive medical conditions. No wonder, communication breakdowns are at the core of all emergency room errors. Doctors sometimes even have the right information, but fail to process or verify health records correctly, which can lead to:
- Misdiagnosis;
- Delayed treatment;
- Medication errors;
- Premature discharge.
Even though emergency department lapses are a primary reason for hundreds of thousands of unnecessary treatments and prolonged medical conditions annually, few errors are more terrifying than those mistakes that take place during surgery. Consider just a few reasons due to:
- Fatigue;
- Incompetence;
- Disregard for hospital protocols and procedures;
- Neglect.
Surgery Mishaps
Some 4,000 blunders each year at the hands of surgeons and operating room personnel could have been prevented. In other words, these surgical mistakes, like leaving a sponge or towel inside a patient’s body after an operation or performing surgery on the wrong side of the body or even on the wrong patient, should never have happened. But, they do.
That’s because doctors, nurses and healthcare professionals are only human. And because they are asked to respond heroically to matters of life and death under the most unenviable of conditions, medical errors are bound to happen in emergency and surgery rooms.
Medical Mistakes Causing Injuries and Death
That doesn’t mean medical mistakes should be conceded to bad luck and enabled to perpetuate in the form of unnecessary injuries or even premature and wrongful patient deaths. Physicians, surgeons, and emergency room responders have a responsibility to not only treat and solve problems but acknowledge when medical errors do transpire.
But, not every healthcare professional will do the decent thing. Too many will circle the wagons instead and discount your concerns. When they do turn a deaf ear, you will need a good attorney who will investigate your claims of medical misdoings, sort out the facts and determine why you were left in the dark.
Medical Malpractice Lawsuit
At this point of helplessness and frustration, a medical malpractice lawsuit may be an option to consider. But the sad truth is fewer attorneys are interested in taking on malpractice claims unless fault is indisputably clear and a huge payout can be predicted.
Shiner Law Group thinks otherwise. The malpractice attorneys at Shiner Law Group believe every wrong deserves to be righted and will argue on your behalf; so be it then, in a court of law.
For your free consultation, call 561-777-7700, 24/7.
Based in Boca Raton with offices in Martin and Port St. Lucie counties, Shiner Law Group has a long and wide record in malpractice litigation. The highly experienced attorneys recognize that your claim is unique and will take in account your physical suffering as well as the mental and emotional factors that hospital administrators and insurance often overlook when attempting to reach a settlement.
Perhaps, you were forced to wait for care in a hospital emergency room and now find yourself in worse condition than when you first sought treatment. Or maybe your routine surgery culminated in anything, but ordinary care. Don’t now allow questions of negligence and malpractice to linger, any longer. Pass your criticisms onto the personal injury attorneys at Shiner Law Group, who will exhaust all avenues to do what is best to restore order to your life.
