When we talk about personal injury and medical malpractice, we often refer to the “elements” of a claim: those assertions that must be proven for the claim to succeed. The elements of a medical malpractice claim are:
The element that usually gets the least attention in blogs like this one is that of a doctor’s duty of care. That might be because proving a duty of care exists is more straightforward than proving other elements. It can be challenging to show the extent of a patient’s injury or prove that it was caused by negligence on the part of a doctor. Even if liability in a case is clear, a patient’s economic and noneconomic damages in the case may be disputed.
The fact that a doctor has a duty of care in a medical malpractice case is often clear. But that doesn’t mean it’s unimportant. Let’s unpack what’s involved in the doctor’s duty of care, and why it matters for your malpractice case.
A duty of care is created by the relationship between a doctor and a patient. That relationship may be explicit, such as when a patient signs papers in a doctor’s office agreeing to be treated by that doctor. It may be implicit, as a doctor on a plane volunteering to provide care to a fellow passenger when a flight attendant asks for help.
The duty of care is a doctor’s legal obligation to provide care that meets the accepted standards of the medical profession. What does that mean? Essentially, there is a “standard of care:” what a reasonably prudent doctor in the same situation would do. That makes the duty of care something of a moving target. Let’s say a patient is complaining of severe chest pain and other symptoms that might suggest a heart attack. What is a doctor’s duty of care in that situation?
The answer is different depending on, say, whether the doctor in question is a general practitioner seeing the patient in his office, or a cardiologist examining the patient in the emergency department of a hospital. In the first scenario, the general practitioner almost certainly lacks the in-office resources to diagnose and treat a heart attack. The duty of care in that situation might require the doctor to monitor the patient while the staff calls 911, and have the patient transferred to a hospital immediately.
The cardiologist who meets the patient in the emergency department also has a duty of care. Her training in heart disease should cause her to suspect that the patient is having a heart attack. She has the extensive resources of the hospital at her disposal. A reasonable doctor in that situation would do a rapid triage to determine if the patient is in immediate danger; check their oxygen, blood pressure, and other vital signs; conduct a physical examination for signs of heart attack, and order immediate blood tests and electrocardiogram.
The emergency room doctor’s duty of care might also include ordering oxygen, aspirin to reduce blood clot formation, and nitroglycerin to relieve chest pain. She would also have to make a decision about next steps based on the patient’s test results. In other words, both physicians have a duty of care to the patient. But the requirements of the duty are different, because the doctors’ situations are different.
Once a medical malpractice attorney has established that there was a doctor-patient relationship, they must prove what the duty of care between the doctor and patient was. After all, it is not possible to show that there was a breach (violation) of the duty of care without understanding what the duty was.
To do this, an attorney must show what a reasonably competent doctor in the same field and situation might have done. Typically, that involves presenting:
An attorney cannot simply assert that a doctor should have done a better job. They must present evidence to establish what the doctor was supposed to do, and then show how they failed to meet that standard.
As noted above, the other elements of a medical malpractice case may be more complex and challenging to prove. But if an attorney cannot establish that there was a duty of care, none of that will matter, because the case cannot succeed unless a duty of care is shown.
At the Fraser Law Firm, we don’t take any aspect of our clients’ cases for granted. With meticulous attention to detail, we assemble evidence to prove every aspect of a medical malpractice case, no matter how straightforward it might appear. To learn more about how we can help with your case, contact the Fraser Law Firm to schedule a consultation.
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