Talking About Personal Injury Cases

Posted on: 10 November 2015

Whether due to a diagnosis oversight, the improper use of treatment protocol, or the failure to disclose risks associated with treatments and medications prescribed, you may be eligible to get compensation for specific damages resulting from the negligence of your doctor. After filing a medical malpractice claim with the courts, everything from your pain and suffering to loss of work and medical debt is typically considered compensation. Your malpractice lawyer will take the lead in order to ensure maximum compensation allowance in your case, but there are a few things you can do to participate in the case yourself and help your lawyer achieve their end goals – consider implementing one or more of these ideas:

Take a Series of Photos

One of the best ways to prove any physical harm that you've experienced (such as bruises, serious rashes, burns, or infections) is to document the experience in photos as it unfolds. Start taking photos of your injuries immediately, and take photos at the same time every day thereafter until you are completely healed. This will provide your lawyer with a visual timeline to work with when preparing and executing your case.  

Make sure that the lighting is good enough to see your injuries, yet does not create a glare to ensure that even a slight bruise can be clearly seen. It's also a good idea to make sure that your entire body can be seen in the photos when possible to prove that the injuries you are recording are in the same location in each depiction.

Collect Witness Accounts

Another important way you can help your malpractice lawyer is to speak with any nurses, volunteers, and anyone else who has any knowledge of the negligence you have experienced. For example, if a nurse saw your doctor prescribe you with a medication without disclosing its possible side effects that have resulted in your pain and suffering, ask them to write down the times they witnessed the prescription or interaction and when these accounts took place in addition to specific insights that they might have.

Ask anyone who is willing to speak out for you to write down an account of their insight and knowledge in your case before signing it with their name and contact information. Alternatively, you can create a simple form and make copies to have people fill out which may make the process more streamlined and less intrusive for witnesses.

Maintain a Daily Recovery Diary

Keeping a daily recovery diary will help you mentally process your experience, let go of pent up emotions and feelings, and ensure that you don't forget any important pieces of information that could effectively be used by your lawyer to build a strong malpractice case on your behalf. It is helpful to write in your diary every evening before bed, which will enable you to record incidences such as headaches or nausea that was experienced during that day so you don't have to remember it all to write down the next morning.

Your diary is a good place to record doctor and therapy visits and other significant tasks that have to be done due to your injuries. There is no reason to write down any feelings or interests in this diary that don't have to do with your malpractice case. In fact, this is sure to drown out the significance of any information that does pertain to the case so keep the diary clean, impersonal, and easy to read.

These techniques should be easy to implement and will not only help you prove how much you've been effected due to the actions of your doctor, but they'll also ensure that others won't have to risk a future experience the same negligence your doctor has inflicted on you.