Louisiana medical malpractice: Hospital forgets man on bed pan?

There are two main parts of every Louisiana medical malpractice claim. In the first instance, a plaintiff must prove liability. In medical malpractice lawsuits, that means a plaintiff has to establish by competent evidence that a defendant deviated from the acceptable standard of medical care. In most instances, a plaintiff will seek to demonstrate that one or more defendants were negligent in a manner that proximately caused the injuries suffered.

The second part of a Louisiana medical malpractice claim involves damages. Before damages can be considered, liability must first be proven. Once it is, our courts will adjudicate damages alleged to have been suffered as a result of a defendant’s documented negligence.

A malpractice claim was recently filed against a hospital in Jefferson Parish, along with a nurse and doctor that attended the plaintiff as a patient. He went to the hospital’s emergency room after suffering complications from a fall that occurred about two weeks before. The nurse reportedly gave him an enema, and he was also medicated to the extent that he fell asleep. Consequently, he was left on a bed pan for some four and one half hours. It is claimed that both of his legs were subsequently afflicted with deep vein thrombosis due, in part, to the significant indentations the bed pan caused on his skin.

As this case now works its way through the Louisiana civil justice system, the man will have the opportunity to prove his allegations. It may well be that a jury will determine that the man’s medical care was substandard. If so, he will have the further opportunity to prove to a court the extent of his damages. Once the proof is submitted, a determination will be made as the extent of financial damages the man suffered as a result of the medical malpractice he claims to have occurred.

Source: Louisiana Record, “Man sues hospital who allegedly left him on bedpan for over four hours,” Kyle Barnett, Feb. 15, 2013