If medical providers in Pennsylvania do not exercise a reasonable degree of care when handling patients, they may be held legally accountable for any deaths that occur as a result. In another state, a university has been sued for allegedly causing the death of one patient and injuring another. The university has decided to settle the medical malpractice and wrongful-death lawsuits for nearly $2 million.
In one suit, a 38-year-old man died after his family said he did not receive a correct diagnosis at the university's medical center. According to the complaint, the man was treated at the center for serious rectal pain and kept calling the office with complaints about pain and bleeding; the center told him to simply continue taking pain medication. The man eventually died due to bleeding in his brain, which was caused by a condition that reportedly went undiagnosed. The man's family will receive $1.4 million, and $300,000 will be paid over the course of four years, funding annuities for his kids.
The university additionally agreed to pay a total of $1.75 million to settle one case involving a man who said he was permanently injured due to the substandard care he received at the university. Specifically, he suffered an embolism during a spinal injury. The man said the embolism caused him to suffer spine strokes, brain strokes, vision problems, numbness and heart attacks.
When medical malpractice causes injury to a person, he or she has the right seek damages by filing a claim against the allegedly at-fault health care provider. Likewise, the loved ones of a person who died due to medical malpractice may file a wrongful death claim. A financial award in a medical malpractice case might be helpful for covering burial costs, medical bills and other losses depending on the circumstances of the case in Pennsylvania.