Archives for May 2013

Cardiac Malpractice

Causing nearly 600,000 deaths a year, heart disease is the leading cause of death in this country. Unfortunately, the problem is often made worse by doctors and other medical professionals who don’t identify the signs and symptoms in some patients as heart related.

Medical malpractice lawyers see the same practice mistakes leading to cardiac injury time and again. These include:

  • Misdiagnosis or late diagnosis, especially in younger patients. Doctors are often reluctant to take heart disease warning signs seriously because they think the patient is too young to have a heart attack.
  • Surgical error. All surgeries come with risks, but the chance for medical malpractice makes them even more dangerous. For example, using a cardiopulmonary bypass machine for too long during heart surgery can result in complications for the heart, lungs, kidneys and brain.
  • Medication errors. Errors with medication can occur during prescribing, transcribing, dispensing, administering or monitoring your medication. There is a lot of room for human error in getting the correct medication for your cardiac health issues.

Medical malpractice lawyer Stuart L. Plotnick is committed to making negligent doctors acknowledge and pay for their mistakes. When you are concerned about your heart health, you want to know that a doctor is providing good medical care and not endangering your life with substandard practices.

If you or a loved one has suffered cardiac complications because your doctor has been negligent in your care, please contact the Law Offices of Stuart L. Plotnick for your free consultation with an experienced Maryland medical malpractice lawyer.

Why Do You Need a Medical Malpractice Lawyer?

When you or a loved one is injured by the negligent practice of a doctor or other medical professional, you can feel angry and betrayed. A medical malpractice lawyer can help you understand what went wrong and seek compensation from the doctor, hospital or their insurer.

Experts Needed

Medical malpractice cases require experts to analyze the care you were given and testify that it did not meet the accepted standard of care in that medical community. Whether it’s a hospital error, surgical error, or misdiagnosis, our medical malpractice lawyers understand the complexity of testimony needed for these types of cases. We can make sure you have the right experts to evaluate your claim.

Time Limits

Because of the technical nature of medical malpractices cases, it’s wise to hire a medical malpractice attorney as soon as you know about the injury. In most states a statute of limitation will apply that enforces a time limit on bringing your case. And in every case, it’s better to start gathering information and investigating the incident as soon as possible.

If you or a loved one has suffered injuries because of the negligence of a medical professional, please contact the Law Offices of Stuart L. Plotnick for your free consultation with an experienced Maryland medical malpractice lawyer.

Car Accidents in Parking Lots

Although we often think of parking lots as relatively safe places with slow moving vehicles, these congested areas full of pedestrians and distracted drivers are ripe for car accidents and serious injuries. As a Maryland car accident lawyer, Stuart L. Plotnick has seen client’s lives thrown off course by car accidents in parking lots.

Parking Lots Can Be Deadly

In a study conducted by the National Safety Council’s Journal of Safety Research 2,057 work-related deaths were reported in a ten year period on company parking lots. These are just work-related deaths and don’t take into account other injuries or the thousands of injuries and deaths that occur in shopping center, airport, or other parking lots.

We shouldn’t let our guard down in parking lots. Pedestrians and drivers should treat parking lots with attention and care just as they would an intersection. Car accidents with pedestrians cause more than 70,000 injuries a year.

Avoiding Parking Lot Accidents

Take precautions when driving in a parking lot. Use lower speeds and be aware of your surroundings. Just because you’re driving slowly through a parking lot, doesn’t mean it’s time to pull out your cell phone or send a text.

If you have been injured in a parking lot car accident, please contact the Law Offices of Stuart L. Plotnick for your no-cost consultation with an experienced Maryland car accident lawyer.

Can I Receive Compensation If I had a Preexisting Condition?

Yes. Even if you have preexisting injuries, you can recover compensation for injuries you received because of someone else’s negligence. When you first meet with your Maryland personal injury lawyer you should talk about your preexisting condition and how your injuries have worsened.

You Can Still Receive Compensation

Insurance companies often like to bring up preexisting injuries as a defense to paying out what they should for your recovery. But under the law, the negligent party is responsible for aggravation of your condition. The person at fault doesn’t get to benefit by paying less because you were already injured.

For example, if John had a shoulder injury from playing baseball in high school and he got hit by a truck on the highway, he should still be able to recover compensation for his injuries in the truck accident.

Get Help from a Personal Injury Lawyer

Getting a personal injury lawyer to fight for your rights is important in every case. But if you have a preexisting condition, it’s even more critical to have a personal injury lawyer like Stuart L. Plotnick on your side. He’s worked for the insurance companies. He knows what defenses they will try and how to combat them.

If you’ve been injured in an accident, please contact the Law Offices of Stuart L. Plotnick for your no-cost consultation with an experienced Maryland personal injury lawyer.

What is negligence and can I recover if I am injured?

Negligence of one party causing personal injury to another is one of the most common and leading causes of accident. Here is my take on an explanation of negligence and how it leads to personal injury lawsuits, which I hope you will understand and appreciate in terms of what your rights may be and whether you need help from an attorney.  I write this because I face these common questions and issues when a new client contacts me about an accident or injury that he/she may have sustained and want(s) to know what their rights are and if and what they can recover.

What is negligence and how is the defendant found to be at fault ? In short, negligence occurs in several ways.  First, you need to accept the fact that we live in a world of rules and regulations as to how we are supposed to interact or “play” with each other.  Negligence occurs when one person does not follow a rule of the game (i.e. legal duty) at all, or they perform the rule or duty improperly and this failure results in an accident to somebody, which in turn gives rise to a claim or lawsuit.    The law holds the person who did not follow the rule to be responsible to the injured party or “Plaintiff” for all injuries, losses or damages  caused by the failure to meet the rule.

Not Criminal; I did not mean to hurt you: In cases of negligence the conduct of the wrong-doer is not intentional.  The wrong-doer usually does not intend to break the rule or hurt anyone, as in criminal cases where the defendant wants to hurt or do harm.  In a negligence case, the defendant usually just did not know the rule, was mistaken about it, or was not paying attention with the level of detail that the rule requires, and as a result did not live up to the standard of action required. That’s why we use the word accident when discussing negligence and personal accident cases.

How do we know if there is negligence:  We live in a society where there are certain laws, rules or regulations, and essentially “codes” of acceptable behavior or conduct that create standards of care which serve as a measuring stick as to how we should act, or not, in almost every situation or activity.     Driving is great example. How often do we drive by the scene of a car accident on the way to work and pause to think about what happened?  The driver of one of the cars had a duty either imposed by the law, an unwritten rule of the road, or common sense to drive his car in a certain manner or standard, but failed to, which resulted in the auto-accident and possibly personal injuries to the other driver.    That duty or obligation may be to stop at the stop–sign, drive at a certain rate of speed, follow at a certain safe distance, keep the car brakes in good working order, or obey some other traffic signal or rule of the road, but due to some reason, which is or is not excusable, the driver failed to live up to this standard or rule, and bang, causes an auto-accident, injuring somebody else .  This same concept that applies to the auto-accident applies to more complicated matters such as a medical malpractice case, where the doctor did not meet the rule/standard e.g. missed something during the patient examination or made a mistake performing a surgical procedure, that is determined, based upon a rule or practice in medicine, to be something he/she should have seen or done.  This failure then leads to some injury to the patient.

Instructions on the back of the lawnmower box or in the owner’s manual can also be evidence of the proper standard of care to use, as can common sense, e.g. don’t touch a stove when it’s hot.

Laws, regulations or common practices are usually a good benchmark in determining negligence:      In many cases we look first to see if there are laws or written rules that apply to the situation in order to determine how we are supposed to conduct ourselves. Staying with the auto-accident example, the proper standard of conduct may come from the traffic laws e.g. the speed limit sign posted where the accident occurred.  In a truck accident, the trucking company’s own driving policies and procedures may be proof a standard and the appropriate conduct.   Finally, if there is no fixed law or standard, we look to what reasonable people would deem appropriate conduct in the situation. This is based upon our everyday experience and common sense.  This is called the “reasonable-man” standard.

Also, there may be different levels of duty for identical situations. For example, there will be different level of duty between the driver of a passenger car and the driver of a tractor-trailer carrying dangerous cargo.  We know that the laws of physics do not apply in the same way as to how such vehicles react under the same conditions (e.g. braking on wet roads), so the driver of the tractor-trailer, because it is harder to maneuver and presents a greater danger if driven improperly, will have to be better skilled and perform with a higher level of precaution when driving.  That’s why he/she must have a special license and training. For example, he will have to apply his brakes a further distance back from the red light in order to stop his truck in time on a highway versus the Honda mini-car.

Second, even though there may not be a particular law that spells out word-for-word what is required of the other driver or the doctor, years of experience and human behavior can also provide guidance as to what the proper standard of behavior or duty in a particular situation should be. We don’t need a law to tell us that ice is slippery, and thus in turn creates a duty on a landlord or property owner to clear the ice or take some precaution to make his sidewalk or parking lot safer when there is ice on it. This is common sense based upon experience (slippery ice leads to falls).  We simply know many things or actions are do’s and don’ts, which can create a danger, based upon experience, and as a result it may trigger a duty to protect against them even when there is no formal law or rule on point.

Assuming I have been injured due to negligence; now what. Is there a case! First, keep in mind that there are exceptions to every rule, including the rules of negligence.  These will be discussed in more detail in future writings, but here are some basics.  Contributory Negligence:  First, your attorney must examine the other side of the coin. There are always two sides to a story.  A key one is, did you have any role in causing the accident that has harmed you.  If you did, you will likely not win your claim.  The law calls this defense or bar, contributory negligence.  Contributory negligence is a harsh and even unfair to injured Plaintiffs because it is not a “majority wins” rule.  For example, in the auto-accident case above, we learn that the driver who was hit in the rear stopped short possibly not giving the other driver sufficient notice or distance to slow down, or the victim changed lanes in front of the Defendant right before the impact.  It is possible that a jury could find that the act of stopping short was not only improper but it too was negligent and contributed to the accident.  The Plaintiff loses!

If you see the ice, you too have to be more careful. The rule is so harsh that it holds that the Defendant can be 99% at fault, and the victim only 1%, but that is enough to defeat the case. Maryland, the District of Columbia and Virginia are several of many states that apply this all or nothing approach to negligence claims.

What if there is no contributory negligence or fault on my part; then do I win?  Well maybe; it depends: In any claim there are two parts the we as lawyers and our clients must examine; who is responsibile (negligence—see above); and what are the injuries or damages caused, if any.  Let’s assume the Plaintiff (Car #1) who is hit from behind was not negligent in any way, so they will win on negligence, the next part of the evaluation becomes are there losses or injuries worth pursuing, and if so, do we any have other issues.  If you just stubbed your toe, well then a lawyer is not likely to take your case because it has no value, whereas if you were severely injured, the value is much greater.  This is the Catch-22.  Would you rather have little or no damage and get little or no recovery, or be able to get a large settlement, but only  because you have been severely injured!  I would hope the first situation, where you are okay and good as new in a few days or weeks.

The world of causation:  Assuming you do have an accident or loss that has some value attached to it, the next question is what we call one of causation.  Did the accident cause your injury or did something else?  Example:  John has had back problems for the last 5 years.  He has had a surgery and is still under the care of doctors for his back at the time of his accident where he is clearly the victim.  He claims an injury to same part of his back that has bothered him for many years.  This is a causation problem.  We have to be able to separate the two injuries, the one from the accident and the one from John’s previous/ongoing back issues. If we cannot, it is an uphill, difficult battle for John because there is another reasonable explanation for his back damage.  Thus, the closer the overlap in time and location between the one accident and the other, the harder the case. Separate body-part: Now on the other hand, if John was under care for his lower back at the time of the accident, and now has problems in his neck (upper back) and left arm, then there is a clearly separate injury caused by the accident. Aggravation of prior injuries:  Let’s use John and his auto-accident again.  If John did have a prior back problem, but it was 10 years ago and there is no treatment or complaints from John for 10 years, and then the accident causes his damage to flare-up all over again, then the law holds the negligent party potentially for what is called an aggravation of a preexisting injury i.e. John was doing just fine until you hit him.  The important factor here is we have a gap in time between John’s past damage and the flare-up.  We can show separation and two distinct timeframes.

I hope this helps. If you have suffered a personal injury due to negligence, or if you need our help with an employment discrimination claim, please contact the Law Offices of Stuart L. Plotnick, LLC today to schedule a free case evaluation with one of our experienced Maryland personal injury attorneys. We look forward to meeting you.