Anesthesia Mistakes Cause Death

The workings of general anesthesia are very complex.   When a patient is put under for surgery, the anesthesia makes the patient immobile, unconscious, and unable to remember the surgical event or feel pain.  That is, as long as the anesthesia is administered correctly.

This experienced medical malpractice attorney in Kingston, New York has seen many scary tales about anesthesia errors.  Consider the following story.  A female patient was put under for cancer surgery.  She awoke during surgery, but she could not move or speak.  She could, however, feel pain and she indeed felt the surgeon’s scalpel cutting into her flesh.  Apparently, the anesthesia made her immobile, but was not able to keep her asleep and pain free.   She was later informed that the anesthesia machines were defective.

Readers should know that this type of incident is not just a onetime event.  It has happened to many people.  The story above is essentially about equipment malfunction.  But the doctors can be to blame too.  Did they check the machine to see if it was working properly?  When was the machine last serviced?  Was the machine out of date or too old to be used?  You see, even though the equipment worked wrong, the doctors can be to blame.

Medical professionals can also be negligent for: failing to properly monitor the patient under anesthesia; failing to properly intubate; adverse drug reactions; delayed drug delivery; giving too much drugs; administering too little medication; and giving the wrong medication due to patient allergies.

As you can tell from the story above, negligent delivery of anesthesia can cause the patient to be awake and conscious of the pain associated with surgery.  The pain and suffering attributed to feeling a scalpel cut into one’s body is immense and unimaginable.   Other consequences of negligent anesthesia delivery include:

• Death
• Coma
• Heart attack
• Cognitive loss
• Paralysis
• Asphyxia
• Brain damage
• Oxygen depravation
• Spinal cord injury
• Birth injury and other defects

All of these injuries can end up being permanent and life altering.  In some instances, the injury will be temporary, but nonetheless still significant.

Anesthesiologists must perform their services as would any other anesthesiologist.  Their professional requirements are dictated to them and they must not stray away from those standards to the point that another anesthesiologist would never have made such a deviation.

Injured patients should rest assured knowing that they can receive compensation when the negligence of an anesthesiologist causes them injury and damages.

But what do you think?  I would love to hear from you!  Leave a comment or I also welcome your phone call on my toll-free cell at 1-866-889-6882 or you can drop me an e-mail at jfisher@fishermalpracticelaw.com.  You are always welcome to request my FREE book, The Seven Deadly Mistakes of Malpractice Victims, at the home page of my website at www.protectingpatientrights.com.