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Under Louisiana law, medical malpractice or negligence is a civil proceeding involving medical negligence, simply an act or an omission on the part of a healthcare professional that falls below an acceptable standard of care. However, it is often difficult to determine since the standard of care varies based upon the specialization or field of practice. If a doctor, nurse practitioner, or any other healthcare professional has a subspecialty, they would have a national standard, meaning the reasonable standard at which each professional must operate…Read More
To file a medical malpractice claim in Louisiana, you have a year from the date of the act or the omission, or one year from the date that you knew or should have known of the act or the omission that caused injury to your person. But in no case shall it exceed three years from the date of the act or the omission. Rather than the statute of limitations as it is known throughout the country, it is known as a prescription in Louisiana. So, the prescription for any negligence claim is one year throughout the state, whether it’s medical negligence, auto accident case, or any other type of civil case. But in the case of medical practitioners, a qualified healthcare provider, it shall not exceed three years…Read More
Generally speaking, medical malpractice claims are not more complicated if resulting from an elective procedure. Proving the standard of care is going to be the same process. At the same time, some jurisdictions have a different standard of care for emergency providers because those professionals have caused legislation to be passed on the rationale that they have less time to make decisions, and therefore, they shouldn’t be held to the same standard. That doesn’t apply in Louisiana. So, when it comes to an elective procedure, the same principles apply, whether or not they met the standard of care for their subspecialty applies whether it’s an elective procedure or something declared urgent or necessary…Read More
There is a $500,000 cap that applies to judgments and settlements in Louisiana relating to medical malpractice suits.
To prove malpractice, you will need an expert in the field in which you encountered the malpractice. For liability purposes, you may need an expert to establish causation as well. Then you will need an expert to establish and assess damages if your damages are economic, such as lost earnings. Finally, you would need fact witnesses to show the fact of the case. Still, our Supreme Court and appellate courts have made it clear that there are rarely circumstances whereby an act or an omission on the part of a healthcare professional is on its face a violation of the standard of care. We don’t need an expert for that, but you’d be surprised to see the reported cases where a sponge is left in a patient and years later, it causes problems, and the courts have declared that to not be a violation of the standard of care on the part of the doctor…Read More
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