Doctors and other medical professionals have a big responsibility when it comes to providing proper medical care. Typically, they have to do everything in their power to ensure that a patient receives the best medical care possible.
Unfortunately, this does not always happen. Sometimes, it even results in tragic death.
Medical errors are the third leading cause of death in the United States.
Once in a while, things go wrong when doctors operate on a patient. Some people argue medical malpractice when this happens. Other times, there can be battery in medical malpractice cases.
What is the difference between medical malpractice vs. medical battery? What do you do if medical battery occurs?
This guide answers those questions and more.
Medical Malpractice
Before we can dive into the differences between medical battery vs. medical malpractice, you need to understand what each is. So, let’s start with medical malpractice.
Medical malpractice occurs when there is negligence by a doctor or a primary physician that results in death or permanent physical damage. There is no intent by the doctors here but the argument in these types of cases is that the doctor or primary physician did not live up to the duty of care that they owed that patient.
An example can be if a patient goes to a hospital because of a stroke. Doctors have routine procedures that they have to do for most patients in this situation.
However, a doctor may have slipped up one day and forgot to do a procedure that could have led to the real problem. Once that happened, it is possible that it was too late to undo it and it could have led to the patient’s death.
That is an example of negligence because in this case, there was a clear procedure that the doctor should have gone through before going any further with the patient. While there was no intent to cause harm here, they did not honor the duty of care owed to the patient because the doctor failed to do these routine procedures.
Battery in Medical Malpractice Cases
Now that you have a better understanding of medical malpractice, let’s dive into medical battery. This is unlikely to be a case where a doctor goes in and intentionally kills a patient. It is a little more complicated than that.
What typically happens with medical battery cases is that a doctor fails to explain to the patient what a procedure is going to involve. Sometimes, this has deadly consequences and it results in a wrongful death. People can argue in this situation that had a doctor been more transparent about the risks of this procedure, a patient may not have agreed to do it in the first place.
Let’s say that a patient comes to a doctor with a bad lung and has to have it surgically removed. This is a somewhat risky surgery considering that there is more than a 10% chance of death immediately after the surgery.
A responsible doctor would tell the patient that there is a real risk that they could die from this procedure. However, an irresponsible patient may fail to tell the patient the chances that they have of dying from this.
If they end up dead after this procedure and there is a loved one as a witness prior to the surgery, this doctor could be in hot water for medical battery.
The key in these cases tend to be consent from the patient to move forward with a procedure.
Factors to Challenge Medical Battery Claims
Of course, doctors and hospitals are not going to go down without a fight here. In all likelihood, there will be a veteran lawyer or even a team of lawyers on their side to defend their case.
So, if you believe that you have a medical battery case, you have to be ready for certain challenges to your claim.
An example may be that the defendant may claim that they told the patient about these risks in private. In that situation, a loved one may have to keep track of a careful log to determine if there was any chance that the patient could have had a serious talk like this alone with their doctor.
Another thing you need to watch out for is the defendant claiming that the patient contributed to their own death. Most of the time, they will claim that the patient committed at least one irresponsible act.
Let’s go back to the lung surgery as an example. If it gets discovered that the same patient smoked a pack of cigarettes right before they had this surgery, that could damage their case. The argument could be that the patient was doing further damage to their lungs right before having major surgery.
Be aware of these possibilities and be prepared to have to defend your position. Luckily, you do have options for help with this.
Get Justice for Battery in Medical Malpractice Cases
These are some things that you need to know about battery in medical malpractice cases. Know that consent for the procedure is the biggest difference between medical battery vs. malpractice.
If you are going to argue that a doctor or hospital committed medical battery, you better be ready with some hard evidence that this did occur.
Going up against their lawyers can be a daunting process. That is why you need a strong lawyer of your own by your side.
Message us here to get a free consultation for your case.
Posted in: Medical Malpractice