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Medical Malpractice Attorneys in Kentucky

What many people don’t know is that medical malpractice is actually one of the more prominent causes of death in the United States. Medical errors may account for anywhere between 250,000 – 400,000 deaths per year, but less than 10% of these errors ever get reported. It leaves families devastated, both financially and emotionally, from the premature, unnecessary, and preventable deaths of their loved ones. Meanwhile, those who survive medical malpractice are often left with debilitating, severe, and life-long injuries.

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At The Lawrence Firm, our Cincinnati and Covington medical malpractice attorneys are highly experienced with the complexity of medical malpractice cases and are dedicated to helping victims and their families recover maximum compensation as permitted by law for their suffering and losses. If you live in the southwest Ohio area or Northern Kentucky area and seek a competent law firm to recover damages for your losses, call a top Kentucky medical malpractice attorney today at 800-698-4054.

What is Medical Malpractice?

Medical malpractice occurs when a health care practitioner or provider fails to offer adequate treatment, fails to take the required action, or provides inferior treatment and the patient suffers damage, injury, or wrongful death. A medical mistake of such magnitude is usually the cause of malpractice or neglect. This could range from anything such as misdiagnosis, improper drug administration, insufficient health management or therapy, and inappropriate aftercare. 

Types of Medical Malpractice

There are a number of ways that medical professionals can act with negligence that may result in medical malpractice lawsuits in Ohio or Kentucky. Numerous medical professionals may be involved in your case. Doctors, surgeons, nurses, pharmacists, lab technicians, and other medical personnel can all be guilty of making serious medical mistakes or negligent errors. Some of the more common types of malpractice that a Kentucky medical malpractice attorney at The Lawrence Firm may see include:

  • Physician Malpractice: Physicians are involved in such a wide range of their clients’ medical lives that there are a number areas where medical malpractice can occur, such as misdiagnosis.
  • Surgery-Related Injuries: Surgeons have an incredibly important job with a lot riding on their performance. Unfortunately, it is not uncommon for surgeons to commit surgical errors that can result in serious and often life-altering repercussions for the patient.
  • Anesthesia Mistakes: Anesthesia overdose and other forms of anesthesia-related negligence can lead to devastating injuries or death.
  • Hospital Mistakes: Defective medical equipment, staff and nursing negligence, medical record and documentation negligence, pharmacy negligence, and other administrative errors can be catastrophic for hospital patients.
  • Emergency Room Negligence: When people seek urgent medical care, it is typically because they are suffering from serious, acute, and even life-threatening injuries. When they receive negligent care that results in further illness or death, they have the right to seek compensation and justice.
  • Medication Errors: Whenever a doctor prescribes a drug, several problems can arise. Prescriptions are improperly written, pharmacies mix up medications, labels are created incorrectly, and nurses make mistakes in administering drugs. All of these things and more can lead to a disastrous outcome, including a potential pain medication overdose.
  • Nursing Home Negligence: When a loved one in a nursing home or other long-term care facility is injured or neglected, those responsible may be held legally liable. 
  • Wrongful Death: The death of a loved one resulting from medical negligence can be devastating. In these cases, it’s crucial that the victim’s families are justly compensated for their loss.

Medical Malpractice Law

Every year, between 15,000 and 19,000 medical malpractice cases against doctors are filed in the United States, according to the Medical Malpractice Center.

Under medical malpractice law, hospitals, doctors, or other health-care providers are expected to meet a certain standard of care. The professional is legally liable if the patient suffers harm or injury as a result of the health provider’s deviation from the standard of care in comparable instances. As a result, patients may seek compensation for any injuries they suffer as a result of poor medical treatment.

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Ohio Malpractice Law

Medical malpractice standards and laws range from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. In Ohio, any medical malpractice case filed in state courts must be supported by a “Affidavit of Merit” from an expert witness, typically a doctor or other qualified health care practitioner, who swears under oath that the expert:

  1. Has gone through all of the plaintiff’s medical records 
  2. Is familiar with the medical standard of care that relates to the plaintiff’s treatment
  3. Believes that the standard of care was not followed and that the plaintiff was harmed as a consequence.

A complaint for medical malpractice in Ohio that is not supported by an Affidavit of Merit will likely be dismissed. A lawsuit filed with an affidavit that does not fulfill all of the standards of the Ohio Rule of Civil Procedure 10(D)(2), however, is less likely to be dismissed. Plaintiffs who want further time to complete the affidavit may also request a filing extension.

Kentucky Malpractice Law

Several states including Kentucky broadly defined malpractice as any incident or event in which a medical professional fails to adhere to or live up to the routine and applicable standard of care in a given patient’s case, with an aggrieved patient eventually finding ample cause of action to file a medical malpractice lawsuit.

Unlike in Ohio, Kentucky does not require an expert opinion or the testimony of an outside medical provider to present a viable medical malpractice claim. However, many patients fail to recognize that, should the testimony substantiate or corroborate the patient’s claims case, starting the claims case process in a Kentucky medical malpractice lawsuit with the official concurrence of a medical expert may still prove extremely beneficial.

Ohio Statute of Limitations Medical Malpractice

The statute of limitations is the legal term for the deadline in which a plaintiff must file a lawsuit with the courts. According to Ohio Revised Code § 2305.113, prospective plaintiffs must bring their cases to the state’s civil court system within one year after the underlying medical mistake.

The one-year term begins when you discover the harm (or reasonably should have noticed it) or when your provider-patient connection ends, whichever comes first. Ohio’s revised code also establishes an outside four-year time limit for initiating medical malpractice cases. There are some exceptions to this one-year/four-year limit, which can be found in § 2305.113.

Kentucky Statute of Limitations Medical Malpractice

Under Kentucky’s Revised Statutes 413-140 and 413-170, medical malpractice claims in Kentucky must be filed within one year after the accident or error. However, in the event of legitimate and documentable instances of delayed discovery of the injury or harm, the courts may elect to extend any negligence-related action’s limitations period under a statute of repose. This allows citizens five years from the date of suspected negligence or from the date of the discovery of harm as determined by a reasonable person’s standard.

What Damages are Available in a Medical Malpractice Lawsuit?

Like with personal injury cases, there are two categories of damages that can be awarded in medical negligence cases: economic and noneconomic damages. Economic damages entail calculable financial losses that a plaintiff experiences, such as medical expenses and lost income. On the other hand, noneconomic damages are typically more subjective than economic damages. This is because they differ from one plaintiff to the next and are difficult to quantify with a specific number.

Economic damages that are available in a medical malpractice case include:

  • Payment of past and future medical treatment
  • Repayment of lost income, both past and future
  • Compensation for decreased earning capacity
  • Loss of employment or business opportunities
  • Loss of use of property
  • Value of domestic services
  • Any other financial losses resulting from the negligence

Noneconomic damages that are available in a medical malpractice case include compensation for:

  • Pain and suffering
  • Mental anguish
  • Loss of enjoyment of life
  • Loss of society, companionship, and consortium

What is the Cap on Medical Malpractice in Ohio?

The Ohio legislature, like many other states, has enacted legislation that sets a limit or “cap” on the amount of compensation that can be awarded to a plaintiff who is successful in a medical malpractice claim. In other words, even if a jury finds a defendant guilty for malpractice, an Ohio medical malpractice cap (or an Ohio wrongful death damages cap) limits the amount awarded to the plaintiff.

Only noneconomic losses are covered under Ohio’s medical malpractice damages cap. Noneconomic damages in a medical malpractice action may not exceed the greater of $250,000 or three times the plaintiff’s economic losses, with a total limit of $350,000 per plaintiff (or $500,000 in any case involving several plaintiffs) under Ohio Revised Code section 2323.43.

If the negligence resulted in permanent and/or catastrophic damage, the threshold will be raised to $500,000 per plaintiff or $1 million per case.

What is the Cap on Medical Malpractice in Kentucky?

Unlike Ohio and many other states in the U.S., Kentucky does not impose a cap on the amount of compensation available for victims of medical malpractice. This raises the amount of compensation you might obtain from medical malpractice lawsuits in Kentucky.

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Wrongful Death Attorneys: What We Do

The medical malpractice lawyers at our law firm will take the time to listen to your story. We are sensitive to these problems, sympathetic to our clients; and after so many years of experience, we are able to quickly and effectively assess medical malpractice cases. Our law firm will work to identify responsible parties and begin gathering and preparing the evidence for your case. We will contact witnesses, relevant experts, and other professionals who will work with us to demonstrate your damages and prove your case.

We advocate for victims and their families following serious, catastrophic and fatal medical malpractice in recovering the financial compensation they need to begin to restore their lives.We also work toward improving health care so the mistakes that injure our clients are not repeated. We want to see medical errors reduced or eliminated by holding all negligent parties and organizations responsible and legally liable.

Medical Malpractice Attorney Near Me

At The Lawrence Firm, we are Kentucky medical malpractice lawyers who understand the stress that you are facing, including the piling medical bills, lost wages, health issues, and many other struggles associated with you or your loved one’s injuries. It is our job to properly assess your losses and damages to ensure a recovery commensurate with those significant costs. At our firm, you will be represented by compassionate, experienced legal professionals that are understanding toward medical malpractice victims and their families.

Contact a Medical Malpractice Attorney at The Lawrence Firm, PSC

Call or email The Lawrence Firm today to schedule a free initial consultation with our experienced medical malpractice attorneys in Kentucky and Ohio. You can reach us by calling our Covington office at (859) 578-9130, our Cincinnati office at (513) 651-4130, or toll-free at (800) 698-4054.

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You Pay No Fees Unless We Win!

We are happy to offer a free consultation to evaluate your case. If you hire us as your legal counsel, we will represent you on a contingency-fee basis. You will pay no attorneys’ fees unless we recover financial damages.