Welcome to the community dedicated to personal safety, injury prevention and recovery. [What is InjuryBoard?]

Subscribe

RSS Feed

Add us to your favorite RSS reader

or subscribe by plain RSS

Archives

View previous posts from:

Medical Malpractice | InjuryBoard Norfolk

Authored by: James C. LewisA recent study, "What We Know About Malpractice Settlements," which appeared in the Iowa Law Review establishes that the likelihood of payment in a malpractice claim against a negligent physician and the amount paid to the injured patient by that negligent physician was "closely related to the merits of the underlying claim of medical negligence." "Tort reformers"...

As a personal injury lawyer at a law firm which handles plaintiff's side, medical malpractice cases, I find the following reported numbers startling: 1. The majority of medical malpractice claims close without payment to the injured person.2. Only 2% of medical malpractice victims make a claim.3. 80% of the time the doctor or the hospital wins in cases that go to jury verdict.How to reconcile...

One of the main kinds of medical malpractice cases are for injuries or wrongful death that occurs as a result of a doctor making a mistake in diagnosis of the patient. Our law firm handles medical malpractice lawsuits in Virginia (VA), North Carolina (NC), and elsewhere. So, I bought a new book called How Doctors Think hoping it would help the attorneys I work with continue to be among the best...

I have been practicing law in Virginia Beach and Norfolk, Virginia (VA) for about two decades focusing on accidental injury and wrongful death cases. I have heard amazing stories about how million dollar automobile accident cases have gone to lawyers who really had no business handling such a case for all sorts of strange reasons. The suggestions for a person with an accident case in...

Posted by John Cooper |
May 11, 2007 12:52 PM

Our firm uses the slogan "All we do is injury law" to summarize what our firm's focus is. However, there are really many types of cases within personal injury law. As a Virginia (VA) personal injury attorney, it always amazes me that clients may not fully understand what areas of law we practice in when we say we do injury law. I have had a client indicate that he didn't contact me about the...

Recently, a gastric bypass medical error/wrongful death case was settled for over $800,000.00 on the morning of jury trial in Norfolk, Virginia (VA). The case in the Norfolk Circuit Court involved a 28 year old single mother who had an 8 year old handicapped child. After trying to diet and exercise to lose weight, she agreed to undergo a laparoscopic gastric bypass surgery. After the...

As a law firm handling medical malpractice cases in Virginia (VA), North Carolina (NC) and in other states, we spend a lot of time on the phone talking to potential clients about their claims of medical error by doctors and hospitals. Many of these client calls are heartbreaking to hear about loved ones who were severely hurt by the mistakes of a health care provider. However, many of the...

There are some circumstances where the law limits your rights or will not allow you to sue a doctor or hospital worker who has committed medical malpractice on you no matter how bad the medical error is. For example, if you wanted to make a claim against the staff at Portsmouth Naval Hospital in Portsmouth, Virginia (VA), yourinjury attorney will need to look carefully at the question of...

In one of the largest medical malpractice verdicts in U.S. history, a Florida (FL) jury awarded over $200 million to a man who was left brain injured and disabled after emergency room personnel misdiagnosed a stroke as a headache. Ironically, shortly after this malpractice occurred, the Florida (FL) legislature changed their law to impose caps on medical malpractice cases, which would have...

There are ethics rules that apply in Virginia (VA) that say you cannot hold yourself out as a personal injury specialist no matter how specialized you are in personal injury law. In Virginia (VA), there are no recognized specialties in any field of law, including representing injured people. The state could develop a system of certified specialties so that a lawyer who has been practicing in a...

As a personal injury lawyer, it is important to use the AMA guides to permanent partial impairment to your client's advantage. AMA is the American Medical Association, which is the primary national professional group for doctors. They publish and periodically revise a book that sets forth how to quantify permanent partial impairments of various parts of the body after an injury. Most...

In 18 years of practicing injury law, it has never stopped amazing me how insurance companies and corporate defendants will "lose" or outright destroy important evidence about a personal injury accident. It is often hard to prove that this loss of documents in a personal injury case was intentional. However, with big dollars on the line in a serious injury case, some corporate managers forget...

If you can avoid it, do not be in the hospital over a weekend when the less trained and inexperienced staff are in charge. This warning to avoid medical errors by timing your visits to the hospital is particularly true over holiday weekends like July 4th. The reason is simple in my opinion . All medical staff with seniority get off on the weekends and holidays. This leaves fewer experienced...

The regional planners and chambers of commerce have been trying for a decade to come up with a unified name for Southeastern Virginia having settled on Hampton Roads. When I grew up in Norfolk, Virginia in the 1960's, this area was commonly called Tidewater. Whatever the name, the region containing a million and a half people really is a collection of smaller jurisdictions. A personal injury...

In the recent past, the federal courts have changed their rules related to discovery to account for electronic information in civil cases such as wrongful death and personal injury files. Discovery is the process by which the injured person can get information and documents from the at fault party who hurt them. Lawyers representing injured people need to focus on these new rules and the...

Brought to you by

The Virginia Beach personal injury lawyers at Shapiro, Cooper Lewis & Appleton, P.C.
Serving: Virginia Beach, Chesapeake, Chesapeake Beach, Eastern Shore, Emporia, Franklin, Hampton, Isle of Wight County, James City County, Newport News, Norfolk, Petersburg, Portsmouth, Suffolk, Williamsburg, York County
1294 Diamond Springs Road
Virginia Beach, Virginia 23455

Attorneys

Rick Shapiro
| Attorney
John Cooper
| Attorney
Jim Lewis
| Attorney
Randy Appleton
| Attorney

Contact an Attorney

100% Private, 100% Confidential
Your question will be referred to an attorney near you. If your question is of a legal nature, then by submitting this form you agree you are not forming a formal attorney / client relationship.

Regional Blogs