Medical malpractice is legally defined in the law no 95/2006 regarding the reform on the health sector: “Malpractice is the professional error which occurred during the exercise of a medical act, or medical-pharmaceutical act, causing damage to the patient, involving the medical staff and the product and medical services furnishers civil liability”. Malpractice is actually synonym with medical error and medical negligence.
In order to establish if it was malpractice in a certain situation, it needs to be distinguished between error and mistake. So, the mistake represents a doctor failing to obey the rules regarding a doctors professional behavior, where another doctor with the same professional training obeys them, while the error occurs when the complicated evolution of a disease or the atypical symptoms make the doctor react in the same way, regardless the situation.
Offering proper healthcare can be done only after the correct diagnosis of the patient. An error at this stage can lead to the worsening to the patients state or to the inefficiency of the treatment. Patients can be victims of various types of medical errors, such as: wrong treatment, errors during surgery, diseases contacted in hospital, surgeries performed on a different patient than the one who needed them, wrong blood transfusions, objects forgotten in the patient’s body, etc.
A person is entitled to complain about a medical professional when his rights as a patient are violated. Law no 46/2003 establishes the following rights for the patients:
– The right to the highest quality medical care
– The right to be respected as a human being without any discrimination
– The right for receiving medical information
– The right to information confidentiality about the patient’s private life
– Right to medical treatment and care
– The patient has to give consent regarding the medical intervention
For engaging a doctor into legal liability, there has to cumulatively exist: illicit conduct, injury, a causal link between the wrongful conduct and the damaging result, guilt from the medical staff and nonexistent circumstances or causes which could remove their legal responsibility.
The medical staff is not responsible for the damages and losses caused by practicing the profession when:
a) There are caused by the working environment, poor endowment with diagnosis equipment and treatment, nosocomial infections (inner hospital infections), the side effects, the complications and the risks generally accepted of the investigation methods and treatment, hidden defects of the sanitary materials, of the medical equipment and devices, the used medical and sanitary substances.
b) When acting urgently and in good faith and by respecting the granted jurisdiction.
When they become malpractice victims, the patients have three ways to react: they can make a complaint to the College of Physicians, or to the Malpractice committee, or to a lawyer specialized in malpractice cases, in order to formulate a legal criminal complaint or civil procedure, for suing under criminal or civil law, the people responsible for the medical flaw.
Our law firm provides representation and assistance, both for the patients who suffered moral or material damage, as well as for the doctors accused, called and investigated for malpractice either in a civil trial or criminal trial.