Medical negligence is an area of law that deals with cases where a patient has been injured or their health has been adversely affected due to the failure of a medical practitioner to provide adequate care. Medical negligence can occur at any stage of the treatment process, from diagnosis through to post-operative recovery and follow-up care.
There are three main categories of medical negligence cases:
Negligence in diagnosing – this occurs when your doctor fails to diagnose your condition correctly; for example, misdiagnosing you with cancer when it was actually something else such as psoriasis (a skin condition).
Negligence during surgery – this happens when doctors fail to perform certain checks before operating on you or fail to give adequate warnings about possible complications during surgery so that they can be avoided altogether (such as bleeding).
Post-operative care – this type involves instances where patients are not given proper follow up after surgery and/or receive inadequate advice regarding daily living activities such as driving cars or lifting heavy objects following surgery
