California Catastrophic Injury Attorney
Generally speaking, a catastrophic injury is one that causes permanent, severe, functional disability or severe head or neck trauma. It can also be defined as an injury that permanently prevents an individual from working. There is no one precise legal definition for what constitutes a catastrophic injury, but personal injury lawyers generally use this term to describe a horrific injury that is much more costly than other injuries due to the extensive medical care and treatment required as well as the long-term or permanent consequences of the injury. An injury that results in death can also rightly be regarded as a catastrophic injury.
Bertling Law Group represents victims of medical malpractice in California, as well as active-duty military members and veterans nationwide when they have suffered catastrophic injuries because of medical negligence and mistakes committed by doctors, nurses, hospitals, clinics and other medical providers. With decades of experience representing both plaintiffs and defendants in medical malpractice cases, our team has the knowledge and skills needed to figure out what went wrong and hold the responsible parties accountable for their preventable errors. Our goals are to get significant compensation for catastrophic injury victims and their families, obtain justice and accountability for the harm done, and work to see that similar incidents don’t happen to others in the future.
If you or your loved one suffered a catastrophic injury in a California hospital, or a military or VA hospital, clinic or medical center in the United States, call Bertling Law Group at 844-295-7558 for a free consultation to discuss how we can help you recover physically, emotionally, and financially for the expense and suffering inflicted on you by another’s negligence.
Helping Victims and Families Recover From the Most Severe and Catastrophic Injuries
Bertling Law Group is prepared to take on the most serious cases involving the most catastrophic injuries, including:
- Traumatic Brain Injury
- Spinal Cord Injury
- Severe Burn Injury
- Amputation
- Peripheral Nerve Damage
- Wrongful Death
Medical mistakes can inflict catastrophic injuries in many different ways. Below are just some examples.
Misdiagnosis
If a diagnosis is missed or diagnosed improperly, the patient’s condition goes untreated. They could receive the wrong treatment that causes additional injury or no treatment at all. If the correct diagnosis is eventually reached but unreasonably delayed, the patient’s condition might have advanced beyond an easily treatable stage or even become terminal. Some of the most common examples of catastrophic injuries resulting from misdiagnosis include infections that spread, heart disease that causes a preventable heart attack, and cancer that becomes metastatic.
Improper Treatment
If a patient is negligently treated, their otherwise treatable or curable condition will get worse and possibly cause irreversible damage, permanent disabilities, or death.
Surgical Errors
They are called “never events” because they should never happen, but every year patients have the wrong organ or body part operated on, an incorrect incision is made, or an organ is accidentally punctured or perforated. The results can be disastrous or deadly if the wrong is organ is removed because the surgery was performed on the wrong side of the body, leaving the patient with only the diseased organ that still needs to be removed, even though the patient might not be able to live or function without at least one working organ.
Medication Mistakes
Giving the wrong medication or the wrong dosage can lead to overdose or a severe allergic reaction, with consequences including organ failure, paralysis, heart attack, or coma. At the least, the patient is not getting the appropriate medication and could suffer greatly depending on how urgent the need for the medicine is.
Anesthesia Errors
Getting too much anesthesia and too little oxygen or being kept under anesthesia too long can cause permanent and irreversible brain damage. It has been widely reported that hospitals routinely double-book surgeons to maximize the number of operations they can do, keeping patients under anesthesia longer than is needed or safe, solely for the convenience and profit of the doctors and hospitals.
Post-Operative Infections
Proper wound treatment in a sterile environment is essential to prevent post-operative infections, but hospitals are breeding grounds for “superbugs” like C. Diff. and MRSA. Hospital-acquired infections often don’t respond to antibiotics and standard treatment, with the result that patients may require a life-saving amputation to get rid of the infection or risk succumbing to a deadly sepsis infection.
Birth Injuries
Birth injuries can leave an infant with permanent brain damage and a lifetime of physical and cognitive impairment, nerve damage and paralysis, or disfiguring injuries. Malpractice that leads to catastrophic birth injuries can include applying too much force during delivery, taking too long to deliver the baby, or failing to order a c-section when indicated.
Get Appropriate Legal Help After a Catastrophic Injury in a California Hospital
Bertling Law Group is dedicated to helping injury victims and families who have suffered the most catastrophic injuries from medical malpractice in California and nationwide. Call Bertling Law Group at 844-295-7558 for a free consultation to discuss your situation. We’ll go to work figuring out what went wrong and holding the appropriate parties accountable to you for the full measure of harm they have caused.
