As humans, making mistakes while performing work tasks is understandable, and rather expected. But if someone works as a physician who physically interacts with and handles patients daily, they may be given much less leniency. Of course, this is because such errors in judgment may have direct physical implications on their innocent patients. With all that being said, please follow along to find out whether it is okay for physicians to make mistakes and how a proficient New York City physician mistake attorney at Mark L. Bodner, P.C. can help if you have been the victim of such.
Is it okay for physicians to sometimes make mistakes?
In short, a physician’s mistake is only made okay if certain criteria are met. For starters, such a mistake should be minor enough that it does little to no harm to the patient. With that, a physician should always pay attention and admit when they make a mistake to the patient as soon as they realize it. Then, they must take corrective action promptly and reverse it before it causes any further damage to the patient. In the end, a good physician will take this mistake as a learning opportunity to never make it again, so that none of their future patients experience the same issues.
For example, a physician may diagnose their patient with the wrong illness at their first appointment. But at their follow-up appointment, they may acknowledge their patient’s description of symptoms and admit that they may need a new diagnosis. From here, they may order the necessary tests and thoroughly examine their results to come to the right conclusion. Hopefully, not too much time passes in between that a patient’s illness severely progresses or they otherwise unnecessarily experience prolonged pain and suffering when proper treatment was easily accessible to them from the start.
What happens if a physician fails to rectify their mistakes?
As another way of putting it, a physician’s mistake is not okay if their behavior and actions significantly deviate from the accepted standard of care for the patient’s condition. In turn, this behavior and actions may have directly caused the patient to suffer from further injuries, illnesses, or other types of harm and damages that would have otherwise been preventable.
With these factors at play, you may accuse your physician of medical malpractice. This may drive you toward pursuing legal action, so that you may pursue financial compensation for the medical bills, emotional trauma, and other economic and non-economic damages you would have otherwise avoided by having a dutiful physician attend to you.
There is no sense waiting any longer if you already know you wish to pursue a medical malpractice claim. So please reach out to a competent New York City hospital negligence attorney at Mark L. Bodner, P.C. today.