Medical Malpractice And Spinal Cord Injuries

When operating on a patient’s spine, the surgeon must use the degree of caution that which another spinal surgeon would use when completing the surgery. The surgeon’s duty to the patient requires such. If a back surgeon breaches this duty in a way that another similarly situated doctor would not have, then the offending surgeon can be held liable for the patient’s injuries and damages.

The experienced Kingston, New York spinal cord injury attorney has seen spinal cord surgeons operate on the wrong part of the spine; this is referred to as a wrong level surgery. Sometimes during spinal fusion surgeries, the surgeon makes a mistake and the vertebrae are not fused properly. Objects such as screws, pins, plates, and rods can and have been negligently inserted into the patient. Nerves in the spinal column have been negligently nicked and or severed.

If the surgeon recognizes the mistake during surgery, the error can be immediately fixed. But it could mean that the patient had to spend more time under anesthesia, which can lead to irreversible damage to the patient’s sensory functions. Sometimes the error is noticed right away, but the surgeon is not able to repair the harm. The victim could then be left with permanent consequences such as tingling, numbness, pain, and or permanent disability such as paralysis.

In other instances where a spinal cord surgery was botched, the mistake is not discovered until after the procedure is finished. The patient notices something wrong during the days, weeks, or months after the surgery was completed. Having doctors investigate the problem will mean more visits to the doctor’s office and the patient will most likely have to undergo another surgery; a surgery that would not have been needed if the surgeon had only done the job right in the first place.

Patients will suffer with pain for longer periods of time, pay more medical bills, face the inherent risks of another surgery, miss more work, lose more wages, and possibly have to confront the possibility that life will never again be the same.

Contacting an experienced medical malpractice attorney quickly is essential when a spinal cord injury gets worse with medical treatment. The right attorney will quickly be able to figure out that the doctor breached his duty of care to the patient; he will show that the breach caused the patient’s injury; and he will be able to show that the injury caused the patient to suffer continued pain and suffering, lost wages, money lost to medical and rehabilitation bills, and the like.

Know that waiting too long can ruin the patient’s case because New York law states that injured patients have a narrow time period in which a suit can be started.

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.