Accidents, or unintentional injuries, are the third leading cause of death in the United States.
Under this umbrella of incidents fall medical malpractice and negligence. As a patient, it’s important to understand your legal rights relating to healthcare.
You may be wondering what the difference malpractice and negligence is. If so, keep reading to learn more about malpractice vs negligence.
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Malpractice vs Negligence
Mistakes can happen in many different ways in the medical field.
Even the brightest doctors can make mistakes. This is where it helps to understand the difference between negligence and malpractice. While learning from mistakes is an essential part of progressing in modern medicine, sometimes they can happen at the cost of a patient.
It’s important to understand your legal rights pertaining to medical malpractice and negligence. Many people are confused about the difference between malpractice and negligence. Here are the differences:
What Is Medical Malpractice?
Medical malpractice is when a professional in the medical field doesn’t provide an acceptable form of treatment for their patient.
A patient deserves an acceptable standard of practice when receiving treatment. This applies during the diagnosis period, during surgery, and during recovery.
When a medical professional ignores these standards causing injury or harm, the patient is entitled to take legal action.
Examples of medical malpractice can include:
- Surgery being performed unnecessarily
- A surgery scheduled and performed incorrectly or for the wrong body part
- A patient committing suicide under the care of a hospital or other medical facility
Basically, any harm that can be blamed on the actions of the hospital staff is grounds for a medical malpractice lawsuit.
What Is Medical Negligence?
On the other hand, medical negligence is when a medical professional makes a mistake relating to the patient’s care.
If the medical professional makes a mistake that causes the patient to die, experience injury, or experience harm in some way, that is a case of medical negligence. Common examples of medical negligence are:
- Misdiagnosis
- Failure to diagnosis a preventable illness or disease
- Mistakes regarding anesthesia
- Mistakes during childbirth
It is the medical professional’s job to understand the standard of care, so when they make a mistake, the patient can sue for medical negligence.
The Difference Between Medical Negligence and Medical Malpractice
While both of these cases result in harm for the patient, the intent is what makes them different.
In the case of negligence, the medical professional made a mistake. In the case of malpractice, a doctor is ignoring the standards set in place for their patient’s treatment. While that doesn’t mean they wanted to hurt the patient, they did ignore the necessary standards, willing to risk the outcome.
Read this helpful guide to find the best attorney for your case.
Are You Ready To Seek Justice?
If you’ve been the victim of medical malpractice or a medical negligence case, it’s time to seek the justice that you deserve.
Now that you know the difference between malpractice vs negligence, you can seek the help you need for compensation. If you found this article helpful, check out our other health content!
