When you go to the emergency room, the last thing you want is for the situation to get worse. However, a surprisingly high percentage of ER cases end up involving misdiagnoses or malpractice. By one estimate, more than 5% of ER visits result in at least a minor mistake, and more than 2% lead to serious concerns. At the same time, the seriously harmful cases are less than a percent of all visits each year, which still means hundreds of thousands of permanent disabilities or deaths that come down to malpractice.
It is important to understand how often ER mistakes occur. Likewise, you need to know what your legal options are. Here is a look at what you ought to know if the unthinkable happens during your emergency room care.
The Frequency and Type of ER Mistakes
Roughly 130 million emergency room visits occur each year. Unsurprisingly, a quarter to a third of those visits involve people who come to the ER one or more times during the same year. Chronic conditions and the consequences of prior misdiagnoses are among the biggest reasons people end up back in the ER. Both create challenging situations that lead to more malpractice.
Just five conditions account for nearly 40% of cases that lead to serious harm. Stroke is one of the most commonly misdiagnosed problems because the symptoms can be hard to detect, and patients sometimes struggle to convey that something is wrong.
Heart attacks also go improperly treated, sometimes mistaken for digestive issues. Also, doctors have a documented history of being more dismissive of female patients who report heart attack symptoms. Likewise, non-white patients suffer higher rates of misdiagnosis for heart attacks.
Aortic aneurysms or dissections are among the scariest of the top five issues. These can lead to the aorta losing blood into the body cavity. Left undiagnosed, they are frequently fatal.
Blood clots are another source of concern. Blood clots occur for natural reasons, such as existing conditions or a healing body. Some people experience blood clots following inpatient surgeries.
Spinal damage goes unnoticed because the symptoms often manifest as nerve pain or other neurological issues. A spinal cord compression or injury requires specialized testing to catch. Also, spinal abscesses can be especially tricky to diagnose if a doctor’s starting point doesn’t already make them suspicious of the condition.
According to research from Johns Hopkins, nearly 800,000 people each year in the United States suffer a permanently disabling injury or death due to an emergency room visit. While diagnostic accuracy is high, the consequences of malpractice are too severe to ignore.
What Drives Mistakes in the Emergency Room
Omissions are among the most common mistakes that occur in the ER. By one estimate, 50-60% of mistakes boil down to either failing to order a test at all or someone ordering the wrong test. The intake process frequently fails to develop a sufficient understanding of the patient’s medical history. Likewise, the physical exam might fall short or not happen, especially if doctors and nurses are trying to stabilize a patient’s condition.
Delayed treatment is another common class of omission. In particular, patients often suffer because no one orders antibiotics soon enough to ward off the onset of sepsis.
Just because tests happened doesn’t mean they lead to correct treatment. Sometimes, a hospital shift simply misses the handoff as crews change. Consequently, a test just sits there with results and no one reading them because no one knows to check. Also, a doctor might look past an abnormal test result.
Medication errors are another big issue. A doctor might prescribe the wrong drug or dose. Likewise, the doctor might get it right, but a nurse, a pharmacist, or a technician might mess up the order. Emergency rooms also frequently fail to fully test for potential interactions with a patient’s condition or their other prescriptions. Antibiotics, anticoagulants, and opioids are among the most common sources of trouble with drugs in the ER.
System errors and fatigue are just as problematic. Simply failing to document treatment or documenting something incorrectly can throw off a person’s treatment enough to be disabling or lethal. Hospital staff members are oftentimes overworked and tired, especially during night shifts and holidays. This leads to even more lapses in vigilance. Throw in crowded hospitals, lack of staffing, and unexpected events, and you can see how things go badly wrong.
Is It Medical Malpractice?
Many people avoid talking with an experienced medical malpractice lawyer like the attorneys at Thomas Law Offices because they think they don’t have a strong case or they assume the hospital acted in good faith. While not every mistake constitutes medical malpractice, it is worth talking with an attorney if you feel something went seriously wrong.
A claim of medical malpractice starts with whether there was any harm. If a nurse gives you aspirin instead of Tylenol, but nothing comes of it, then there was no harm and therefore no medical malpractice.
If there was harm, then the next question involves the standard of care. For every condition, there is a standard for how a doctor would typically treat it. Because all doctors do things at least a little differently from others, the issue is more about whether another doctor would be shocked by the omissions or choices. If a doctor used a slightly outdated procedure that is still performed, for example, that probably isn’t malpractice. If a doctor ignored guidelines to never perform a procedure, then that might be malpractice.
Notably, the law gives some leeway in the provision of ER care. The law understands that these are difficult conditions. However, the law also notes that the difficulties do not wipe out the duty of care. Emergency treatment calls for serious attention to mistakes by doctors, nurses, and technicians. You do have the right to pursue a claim if you feel that you were the victim of medical malpractice.
