There are 73 hospitals across West Virginia, including CAMC General Hospital, Thomas Memorial Hospital, and J.W. Ruby Memorial Hospital, right here in Charleston.
These hospitals provide quality care for thousands of residents every day. When you check into a hospital, your interactions are limited to the immediate staff who are helping with your condition.
Meanwhile, there is an entire administrative staff and board that support the facility.
These are the people who set the hospital’s policies, covering everything from hiring procedures to cafeteria menus. Hospital policies are the foundation of patient safety.
They can also play a significant role in malpractice litigation. When a hospital has rigorous safety guidelines in place, it establishes its duty of care for patients. If those policies are out of date or not enforced, it can be evidence of negligence. This is the type of investigation that an experienced Charleston medical malpractice attorney can help with.
What Is the Role of Hospital Policies in Medical Care?
A hospital’s policies provide the foundation for that institution’s standard of care. The goal of these policies is to ensure safe and consistent care across every department. They are meant to protect patients and the hospital itself.
These are the key roles of hospital policies:
Patient Safety and Standardization
Hospital policies enforce the best practices and detail step-by-step procedures designed to reduce human error in critical moments. They ensure that every patient receives standardized, high-quality care.
Legal and Regulatory Compliance
Every hospital falls under the purview of state and federal healthcare laws. A hospital’s policies ensure that the facility complies with applicable laws and accreditation standards.
Patient Rights
Hospital policies need to outline protocols for patient privacy, visitation, and end-of-life care. They need to conform to moral and legal boundaries that ensure all demographics receive fair treatment.
Operational Efficiency
Hospital policies also cover the day-to-day logistics of maintaining the institution.
That includes how patient intake, charting, and equipment sanitation are handled. They should also dictate hiring practices for every employee.
These policies are intended to ensure a standard of care. A deviation caused by negligence can constitute an actionable cause of medical malpractice.
Common Policy Failures Leading to Malpractice Claims
Hospital policies and procedures should be viewed as a “road map” for staff to follow to ensure patients receive the best possible care. When the staff strays from those policies, a patient’s health can be compromised.
These are the common policy errors that lead to malpractice claims:
Communication Gaffes
Strong communication is vital for patient care. In a hospital, detailed communication is essential during shift changes when staff hand off. If policies aren’t followed, treatments or medications may be missed, which can affect a patient’s health.
Communication also covers informed consent. A patient needs to be thoroughly informed about the risks, alternatives, and expected outcomes of any treatment prior to its being carried out.
That lack of information can become a liability issue for the hospital.
Inadequate Documentation and Charting
Every set of hospital policies dictates how a patient’s chart should be documented.
These will often follow state and federal procedures. When documentation is incomplete or missing, including lost documents or incomplete notes, it can be another reason for a lapse in care.
Delayed Diagnosis
A hospital’s policies begin in the emergency room, where the proper triage procedures are spelled out. Failure to order necessary diagnostic tests or misinterpretation of those tests can lead to harm to the patient.
Proving Negligence Against a Hospital
In a medical malpractice case where the hospital is named as a defendant, you need to establish negligence. That often requires looking beyond the actions of a single doctor or nurse. There could be broader systematic problems that begin with the hospital’s policies.
Either those policies are outdated, or they weren’t followed. A failure with either of those scenarios can be a clear indication of negligence.
The attorneys at Forbes Law Offices have decades of combined experience helping clients who have suffered harm due to a hospital’s negligence. We have a deep understanding of what is needed to prevail in these types of claims. Involves gathering evidence directly from the hospital, including staffing schedules, incident reports, internal communications, and medical staff bylaws set forth in the hospital’s policies.
Naturally, hospitals and their insurance companies will aggressively defend these claims to protect their reputation. We won’t back down in our pursuit of accountability and compensation.
If you or a loved one suffered injury because of negligent hospital policies or unsafe medical practices, the team at Forbes Law Offices is standing by to help. You can set up a free case review with our legal team to help you understand all your legal options for moving forward with your claim.
You don’t need to be intimidated by a hospital institution.
