Medical Malpractice

Along with the national agencies that regulate auto product liability, smaller local partners also keep an eye on automobile safety standards. One such local agency is the Automotive Product Liability Resource Center (APLRC.com), located in sunny Santa Barbara, CA.

The goal of APLRC.com is to persuade the automobile manufacturers that it is more cost-efficient to manufacture safer automobiles than to pay the high costs of product liability litigation. To that end, the agency serves as a nationwide collaboration of attorneys, experts and victims to increase successful plaintiff verdicts in automobile safety lawsuits.

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New reports from major news sources like the New York Times indicate that America’s new president may be willing to get serious about something doctors have been advocating for some time—a revision of medical malpractice laws.

Though the majority of the Democratic base has traditionally spoken out against limits on medical malpractice suits, for years doctors have been complaining about the high costs of medical malpractice insurance due to the status quo regarding settlement amounts or jury awards in the standard medical malpractice claim.

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The University Of Florida School Of Veterinary Medicine says it’s likely that too much selenium in a compound given to 21 polo horses is what killed them. The 21 polo horses were getting ready to compete in a Florida match on April 19, according to an article.

They all had received an injection only described as a compound consisting of vitamin B12, along with a form of selenium and vitamins and minerals. A similar drug is Biodyl, a French-made compound not approved in the U.S. The horses not injected did not die.

The 21 horses were preparing for a championship match and were flown in from Venezuela. Shortly after being given the unnamed drug, they began crumpling to the ground to the shock of the well-heeled crowd at the International Polo Club Palm Beach in Wellington.

We now know that Franck’s Pharmacy in Ocala prepared the compound. It is a retail compounding pharmacy used by veterinarians and physicians considered one of the biggest and best in the country to create customized formulas.

Franck’s admitted it made an error in the mixture.

Every year in the U.S. there are about 30 million dispensing errors out of three billion prescriptions, according to the National Patient Safety Foundation. Some errors are minor, but others can be serious.
A 2006 Institute of Medicine report called, “Prevention Medication Errors,” points out that these sorts of human errors in medical settings harm at least 1.5 million every year, while more than half of medication errors result in “adverse outcomes” such as death or serious illness.

Prescription errors can be considered negligence or medical malpractice in Florida. Whether dispensing the wrong medication or in the wrong dosage, highly paid professionals should be expected to meet professional standards and show a level of caring.

If you or a loved one has suffered as the result of a prescription error, you may have a claim for medical negligence against the pharmacist, pharmacy, or drug maker. Our skilled Jacksonville pharmaceutical litigation lawyers at Farah and Farah are experienced in investigating claims of medication mistakes resulting in serious injury and wrongful death. Call us today for a case evaluation.

Coming up next week is an issue that affects all Americans who take any kind of drug- virtually all of us.

The case is Wyeth v. Levine and it will be before the U.S. Supreme Court on November 3rd. Now a prestigious medical journal is taking the side of consumers, which puts them squarely against the pharmaceutical industry. That’s a rare position for doctors to take.

In this case, Diana Levine, 62, was given a Wyeth drug for a migraine after she was taken to an emergency room. The Wyeth drug was a secondary drug given to minimize nausea. Now Levine wishes she had opted for the nausea.

Wyeth’s label doesn’t warn against administering the drug as she received it, through something called an IV push. The drug turned her arm gangrenous then she lost much of her right arm, a terrible tragedy for a musician.

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Doctors and patients need to be aware of a substance used to promote bone growth during spine-repair surgery. Made by Medtronic Inc. “Infuse Bone Graft” has led to complications, largely during the “Off-label” use of the liquid.

The FDA has reportedly received 38 adverse health reports over four years concerning side effects. The Infuse Bone Graft is put in a metallic cage containing a spongy material that is placed between the spinal vertebrae. When the drug is used in surgeries on the cervical spine around the neck, it can lead to swelling of the neck and throat tissue.

For patients that means compression in the airway and someone could have difficulty swallowing, breathing and even speaking.

For some patients the symptoms are so bad that a tracheotomomy has had to be performed to allow the patient to breath. For its part, Medtronic says the rate of complications is low and reports to the FDA of problems are few.

The procedure to repair the spine is not uncommon. Every year, an estimated 500,000 undergo spinal-fusion to repair and stabilize damaged discs. Also used to treat conditions such as scoliosis, which is a curvature of the spine, the infuse bone graft has become a best seller for Medtronic, averaging about $815 million in the year that ended in April.

Remember Medtronic is the same company that had to issue a recall of some of its defibrillators because they were prone to depleted battery power. This is a problem for someone who has undergone heart surgery – you’d like there to be few surgeries and for the pacemakers and defibrillators to last many years.

Medtronic also had to recall a line of defibrillator wires which were known to deliver multiple shocks and in some cases death. The company had to settle more than 2,600 lawsuits concerning battery depletion for about $114 million.

A wise consumer must ask their doctor about their financial relationship with Medtronic. Many who are on the receiving end have written favorably about the off-label use of Infuse on web sites.

Conflicts-of-interest are common and justified within the industry. Doctors are paid for giving seminars, for consulting, for educational meetings – and the end result is often that they push the product.

Congress will soon insist that major drug companies disclose these relationships in the name of “transparency” and many have agreed to begin databases, beginning next year to disclose what they pay and to whom. But it pays to ask now. #

Beginning the first day of next year, the Health Care Consumer’s Right to Information Act becomes law. 

This will provide the uninsured medical consumer with reliable and understandable information about health care charges so a patient can make an informed decision.

Often it is the uninsured patient, seeking doctor or hospital services, who is charged a full retail rate, which is higher than the rate an insured patient pays.

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This doesn’t happen very often. If it did, there would be fewer medical malpractice lawsuits, and that would be okay. 

When the chief of staff at a Veterans Hospital in Tampa told the family of a man who died he was sorry, he broke the mold.

Doctors rarely say they are sorry, even when they make horrible mistakes.

There is a national movement afoot to change that. It’s called Sorry Works! Coalition and its founder Doug Wojcieszak calls it a “massive cultural shift.”

“For decades, the typical approach of hospitals and their insurance carriers was shut up, and literally break off communications with the family” he tells the Tampa Tribune.  

 The fear is that people will sense weakness and take advantage of the apology to use against the institution in a lawsuit. 

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Last May the Florida Legislature passed the Pharmacy Technician Act.  

It is a significant piece of legislation that should keep us all safer from the medication errors made by pharmacy technicians. Florida Governor Charlie Crist signed SB 1360 into law in July 2008.

Senate Bill 1360 brings some justice to the Hippely family. Back in the summer of 2002, Beth Hippely of Lakeland, Florida was undergoing treatment for breast cancer. She was taking chemotherapy and the blood thinner, Warfarin, also known as Coumadin.

The pharmacy tech at Walgreens gave her a refill order at ten times the dose for Warfarin. Three weeks on the medication and Beth suffered a massive cerebral hemorrhage. She went into a coma after suffering brain damage and then was put on life support.

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A drug given to treat Parkinson’s disease and restless leg syndrome is the focus of a number of trials underway in the District Court of Minneapolis.

More than 200 plaintiffs are taking their case forward in so-called bellwether jury trials to determine the stregnth and weakness of the cases.

The cases have been consolidated against the drug, Mirapex.

So far it’s not good news for drug makers Pfizer and Boehringer Ingelheim. This week a federal jury agreed the drug contributes to compulsive gambling and awarded a man $8.2 million.

Many people responding to the story think this is a joke, but it’s not.  Compulsive behavior can not only bankrupt you but destroy marriages and lives. Drug makers denied they knew about the potential side effects, but attorneys for the plaintiffs have shown that the drug makers had knowledge of these compulsive side effects back into the 1990s. Apparently the jury agreed.

Mirapex was approved in 1997, but a warning of compulsive behavior was not issued until 2005.  All the while, millions of patients, trying to relieve the tremors of Parkinson’s, took the drug.  Compulsive behaviors observed include not only gambling, but shopping, eating, hypersexuality, porn, and many repetitive behaviors.

The drug makers blamed the compulsive behavior on the patients.

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When you go to the doctor you make a few assumptions. You assume the doctor is a professional who has a license to practice medicine and went to medical school.  You assume they know what they are doing, and care about your welfare. Maybe you assume they have malpractice insurance, just in case something goes wrong. 

After all doctors do make mistakes and they should rightly cover you for any error they make on your body. 

However as the old adage goes -  never assume.  

The Sun-Sentinel newspaper examined a physician database that operates in Florida to find that one-third of the physicians in Miami do not have insurance, and nearly one out of four doctors in Broward and Palm Beach counties are going without. 

Here in North Florida and around the state,about one-eighth of doctors have no medical malpractice insurance.  

A state law allows doctors to opt out of coverage. Essentially you are walking a tight-rope without a safety net if you choose one of these doctors.

Let’s say the doctor cuts off the wrong leg, or leaves a sponge in you during surgery.  Perhaps he doesn’t read the latest on a controversial drug that’s about to be taken off the market.

The damage is bad enough, but without coverage, you are essentially being harmed twice. You can lose the ability to work and have mounting medical bills that you must cover if the doctor elects to go uncovered.  Most lawyers will tell you to forget filing a lawsuit, there is no insurance from which to collect.

For decades doctors in Florida have been able to go without medical malpractice coverage. 

Doctors must alert customers by posting a sign in their office. And they must promise to pay up to $250,000 if a patient receives a malpractice award. Facing that, a doctor could opt to go bankrupt to avoid a large judgment, leaving you with no options. 

One can very quickly surpass medical bills of $250,000, following a serious medical error.  

Chiropractor and Florida State Senator Dennis Jones, R- Seminole is trying to require doctors to have coverage. 

“You have to have insurance to drive a cab, but you don’t have to have insurance to do brain surgery?” Jones said. “Patients basically are at risk.”

The state allowed doctors to opt out years ago to combat the high cost of malpractice premiums that can easily run into the mid-five and even six-figure range for a specialty.  Chiropractors, midwives, some nurses and optometrists still are required to carry coverage.

Yet nobody asks why insurance companies enjoyed 20 percent profits in 2006?   Perhaps they could lower the cost of premiums for doctors who can then be adequately covered. 

Consumers are the losers here. 

If you are the unfortunate victim of medical malpractice, an experienced attorney can help you navigate the system. 

Farah and Farah has been helping victims of medical malpractice for 25 years.  Visit the medical malpractice section of our Web site to have your questions answered.

Call us, but first, please ask your doctor if he or she has medical malpractice insurance. Never assume.