Nursing Malpractice

When people think of medical negligence, what comes to mind is the errors leading to doctors’ medical malpractice.

However, nursing negligence also forms the basis of medical malpractice.

When a nurse acts negligently and makes a mistake that result in patient injury, this may be considered as nursing malpractice.

If you or your loved one has been harmed by nurse negligence, you need to seek damages through a medical malpractice claim.

This article highlights common mistakes amounting to nursing malpractice and who may be held liable for such actions.

Understanding Nursing Negligence

A nurse is a trained health care provider. And when they make a mistake or fail to perform their duties as per the standard of care and such harms a patient, this amounts to nursing malpractice. There are many ways in which a nurse may be involved in nursing malpractice. It could be administering the wrong dose to failure to monitor the patient when they need critical care.

In any nursing malpractice, negligence has to be established.  If in such a situation, the best course of action would be to consult lawyers in Anchorage to help establish fault. The notion that doctors delegate tasks to nurses doesn’t erase the fact that nurses can be held liable for patient treatment mistakes. Meaning, when a nurse makes a mistake, they have to be liable for those mistakes. There are many kinds of mistakes that can amount to nursing malpractice. Some includes:

• Medication errors: One of the common delegated tasks is administering of medication by the nurses. If a doctor offers the right procedure, but a nurse ignores and conducts improper medication administration and this result in a patient injury, this automatically amounts to negligence. Another reason for medication error is when a nurse becomes distracted when administering the drugs to a patient. Other medication errors include:

• Ignoring patient’s medical history.

• Failure to provide medication.

• Administering of the wrong dosage.

• Improper use of medical equipment: Lack of proper use of any medical equipment may cause injuries to the patient. For instance, a nurse may incorrectly use an electrical massager, and this may burn the patient. Also, a piece of surgery equipment such as scissors or sponges may be left inside the patient’s body.

• Poor medical record-keeping: This results in communication errors which is a number one cause of medical malpractices, especially among healthcare providers. If there is improper record-keeping, this may alter the kind of treatment offered to a patient if such a patient gets hurt; this amounts to medical malpractice. One example where such cases occur is in the labor wards. If a nurse records improper monitoring fetus strips or any other symptom of the fetus or the mother, this may cause confusion.

• Failure to monitor patients: Proper monitoring ensures that patients are safe. This can also help early recognition of any issue with such patients. For instance, a diabetic patient needs monitoring of vital signs such as blood sugar levels. If this doesn’t happen, the patient may develop other serious complications such as heart failure that may lead to death.

Who Is liable For Nursing Malpractice?

To file a medical malpractice claim resulting from nursing malpractice, you have to establish fault because most of the errors are preventable. For instance, you can avoid the wrong medication or incorrect dosage.

You can hire a lawyer to help you determine who led to your injuries. Various parties may be held liable for mistakes. They include:

• The nurse: If the nurse ignored the doctor’s orders and this led to the patient harm, such a nurse will be held liable for the injuries.

• The hospital: This happens if the hospital hires incompetent nurses. For the claim, it has to be established that the nurse was an employee of the hospital and that they were within the scope of work when the patient in question was harmed.

• The doctor: If a nurse was receiving an order from the doctor, but such harmed the patient, they may be liable. Again, it has to be established that the liable doctor was present when the mistake happened and was in a position to control the nurse’s negligence. For instance, if a nurse injects a patient into the muscle instead of the vein or offers the wrong dosage to a patient when such a doctor is present, this could results in the patient’s injuries; which may amount to a medical malpractice case.

If you or your loved one was harmed by nurse’s negligence, you can look for an expert witness to testify that a competent person would have conducted themselves differently given the same circumstance.

Not all mistakes may lead to nursing malpractice. If you believe in having a case, it’s advisable to consult an experienced medical malpractice lawyer. Such a lawyer will evaluate your case details and determine whether the nurse misdeeds amount to nursing malpractice.