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Imagine being held legally responsible for everything that goes wrong during your shift—whether you were involved or not. Under the "captain of the ship" legal doctrine, could this be a legal reality? Not likely, according to experts in emergency medicine litigation.
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Many ED physicians do not get blood alcohol levels on intoxicated patients because levels do not correlate well with the patient's mental status or competence, while others say this practice is legally risky. So should blood alcohol levels be obtained?
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Emergency physicians must now ask whether EP-performed ultrasound represents a convenient option or a legal obligation. This article focuses on the history of EP-performed ultrasound and whether this imaging modality triggers a new standard of care in emergency medicine.
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Many ED staff are not aware of the distinction between compensatory, non-compensatory, and punitive damages, and don't realize the many categories for which juries may award damages, says Barbara Pilo, a health care attorney counsel attorney in the litigation section of the Dallas office of Fulbright & Jaworski.
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Increasingly, the anesthesia department is directing guidelines and training requirements for procedural sedation in hospitals, including the ED. Is this practice going to increase your liability risks?
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This is the first of a two-part series on arbitration of medical malpractice disputes. Part one will provide a brief overview of arbitration in general and of selected cases.
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When a group of physicians starting emergency medicine residencies in California were surveyed, researchers found that malpractice fear markedly decreased the interns' enjoyment of medicine.
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To solve the problems that contributed to ED staff actions being considered as potentially criminal in recent cases of patient deaths in Los Angeles and Illinois, the answer doesn't lie in reducing risks of adverse events in patients kept waiting for hours.
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The news stories shocked many Americans: ED staff ignored a dying woman's pleas for help as she bled to death of a perforated bowel on the floor of their waiting room.
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Physicians should not purchase medical malpractice insurance from the surplus lines insurance markets unless there is no coverage available to them from the admitted markets.