Bernstein & Maryanoff

Florida Medical Malpractice Lawyers
Holding Accountable Those Who Fail to Monitor Patients

When people are in the hospital for whatever reason, they need to be observed, especially if they have been there for some sort of a surgery.  The medical reality is that while machines have been invented to automatically alert medical staff to changes and problems, the condition of a patient can take a turn for the worse at almost any time.  When the medical staff at a facility fails to properly monitor a patient, it can lead to dire consequences.  If this has happened to you or to someone you love, seek the help of Florida medical malpractice lawyers as soon as possible.

Parties Responsible for Monitoring

Generally, when a patient is being held at a hospital for observation, it is not the treating doctor who is responsible for the ongoing observation of that patient.  This task is usually left to the staff nurses whose job is to keep tabs on those who are staying in their units and to alert doctors of any reason for them to divert their attention to that patient.

If a nurse or a team of nurses fails to properly handle this important task, it can lead to serious injuries and to death.  For some patients, this result can play out in a matter of seconds, but regardless of their situation, seconds saved can make the difference between disaster and life-saving steps that restore the patient to a condition of stability.

How Failure to Monitor Errors Occur

There are many ways in which a failure to monitor a patient can occur.  In general, nurses can be burdened with as extreme a workload as doctors if the census of the hospital is high at any given time, which means that it’s logically more likely that the needs of an individual patient will be overlooked, if even for a few moments.

In addition, nurses tend to work in shifts.  When shifts change, it can leave a gap in oversight for patients while the outgoing crew leaves and the incoming crew gets situated with their duties for that upcoming shift.  There are supposed to be safeguards for this potential problem, but they are not always followed.

When a failure to monitor a patient occurs and that patient suffers additional health problems or worse as a result, it’s generally the medical facility that would be held liable if a lawsuit is filed and a verdict is returned for the plaintiff.  If this has happened to you or to someone you love, contact the Florida medical malpractice lawyers at Bernstein & Maryanoff today to schedule a free initial consultation.