Analysis of Medical Malpractice - Case Study Example

Download file to see previous pages Mr. Smith signed a consent form but only agreed to the operation because Mrs. Smith had privately threatened to divorce him if he did not. ?As a result of the operation (which was competently performed), Mr. Smith’s tear drainage improved, but he suffered a side effect of poor night vision. The risk of night vision problems was 2 percent, but many doctors consider it a minor problem as it has a limited adverse effect (due to the fact that people are usually asleep at ? night) and the operation is highly effective at improving tear drainage. Mr. Smith is a taxi driver and insists that he would not have had the operation had he known the risk. He is no longer able to work at night and has suffered a loss of income. ?In July, Mr. Smith visited Dr. Zeus, his GP, complaining that his left eye was still sore. Dr. Zeus suspected cancer of the eyelid. The computers were down so Dr. Zeus wrote a note to his receptionist asking him to request a referral to a specialist for Mr. Smith, but the note got lost. As a result, the referral was delayed by 4 weeks. ?In August, Mr. Smith was seen by Dr. Foster who diagnosed an aggressive malignant eyelid cancer (which was unrelated to Mr. Smith’s previous tear drainage problem). Expert evidence is that symptoms of the eyelid cancer would have been visible to a reasonably competent ophthalmologist when the tear drainage surgery was performed. ...
??Here, within different realms of medical malpractice, each aspect of the case will be discussed. Mr. Smith—who seeks financial compensation and complains about his treatment—will be advised to point out all of the following elements to the General Medical Council. II. Negligence Basically, there are four components or criteria of negligence which must be met in order to establish that a patient has a case for medical malpractice (or any kind of tort) (Donoghue v. Stevenson, 2011, pp. 1). Donoghue v. Stevenson was a classic case in the sense that the plaintiff had found snails in her bottled beverage, and claimed that the company owed her damages due to negligence. In a similar manner, Mr. Smith has every right to be upset with not only Dr. Foster, but Mrs. Smith, Dr. Zeus, and Dr. Zeus’s obviously incompetent staff. First of all, Dr. Foster should have mentioned that there was a 2 percent chance that his night vision might be affected. Failure to alert him to this fact is definitely negligent on his part. In addition, Mrs. Smith, his wife, is not only involving herself in the criminal behavior of blackmailing her husband to have the surgery or else divorce him—but she is also criminally liable as a tortfeasor (a person who commits a tort) because she was a consultant ophthalmologist overseeing the surgery superior to Dr. Foster, and she did not report the fact that she saw cancer on her husband’s eyelid. ...Download file to see next pagesRead More