Medical Malpractice Lawyers

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Anesthesia Malpractice

 

Medical malpractice involving anesthesia accounts for many medical malpractice cases in the United States each year. When anesthesia is involved in any surgery or medical or dental procedure, the risks involved with that surgery greatly increase. More often than not, it is the anesthesia that is more dangerous to the patient than the surgeon's scalpel.

 

There is little room for error in any medical situation involving anesthesia. For this reason, allegations of medical malpractice are frequent in anesthesiology because problems are so common, and the resulting outcome for the patient is usually life-threatening. Medical insurance premiums for anesthesiologists are generally very high and substantially higher than most all other medical specialties.

 

The medical malpractice lawyers at our law firm have represented many women and men who have been harmed as a result of problems that occurred while they were under anesthesia or because of adverse effects of the anesthesia.

 

Anesthesiology Medical Malpractice Statistics

The following U.S. statistics provide a clear picture of just how frequent medical malpractice involving anesthesia really is:

 

• Last year, approximately 467 medical malpractice payments were made due to anesthesia-related malpractice.
• In 2002, the mean medical malpractice payment made due to anesthesia-related malpractice was over $330,000.
• Almost 6,000 anesthesia-related medical malpractice payments were made from 1990-2002 with $245,935 being the average payment for anesthesia malpractice.

 

While anesthesia injuries occur most often in the operating room, they can also occur in various other settings, including the pre-operative and recovery rooms, a procedure room, during child delivery, while being sedated for dental procedures and during a wide variety of out-patient medical procedures in medical offices and clinics.

 

Who’s responsible?

Anesthesia medical malpractice cases are not limited to anesthesiologists, since many other medical practitioners administer sedatives and anesthetics. Having specialized training and certification is one way to reduce the risk to the patient, and it is highly likely that the seriousness and rate of complication increase substantially outside the setting of an operating room with an anesthesiologist present. Extremely severe complications and even deaths have occurred in surgery clinics and dental offices during procedures that required general anesthesia, and trained anesthesia staff were typically absent in the majority of these cases.

 

Potential defendants in anesthesia-related medical malpractice cases can include anesthesiologists, nurse anesthetists, nurses, surgeons, doctors, dentists and residents. Demonstrating the negligence of the anesthesiologist or anesthesia staff is extremely difficult because the plaintiff is often unconscious or sedated at the time of the malpractice. In many cases, unreliable and scant records are the only source of information describing what actually happened.

 

Because you or your loved one is sedated or unconscious at the time the anesthesia malpractice occurs, it is imperative that a record of what happened before, during and after the procedure be accurately kept and preserved. A serious injury or death will draw the immediate attention of all the medical professionals involved, and unfortunately, medical records are often altered or even "lost" after mistakes happen.

 

Click here to read a case of New York medical malpractice involving anesthesia.

 

Handling personal injury cases that arises from anesthesia medical malpractice requires the skill of experienced lawyers. Please contact the medical malpractice lawyers at Silberstein, Awad & Miklos, P.C. today to schedule your initial consultation. Our attorneys serve clients in New York, including the Bronx, Brooklyn, Queens, Nassau and Suffolk.

 

 

 

Silberstein, Awad & Miklos, P.C.
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